She won. We'll call her M.
M broke me in every single possible way, and I can't seem to get better.
M manipulated and wove her way through my mind, instilling doubt and making me question my own sanity and whether I was the bad guy here. But sometimes I have moments of clarity where all the pieces fit together and I remember.
It started slowly. One of the first memories I have is of the first times we'd had sex I was very inexperienced, I'd only had one other partner one time. Didn't exactly last long. It was pretty embarrassing for me and I told her so. She said it was okay. But rather than talk to me about it, she went and laughed about it with some of our mutual friends, who were kind enough to let me know she was joking and saying mean things about me in specific detail. She also told my friend that I was a second choice compared to him, but he didn't want her at all. She was flirting around with other guys too, but maybe realized I was the best she could get. She considered me to be sweet and attractive and a good person. I should have just left then, but I didn't want to be alone again.
Before I could call it off, she broke up with me first, and immediately started fucking one of my best friends at the time.
During this time, she started taking drugs and in general went pretty crazy. She tried to kill herself. She had to go to a mental hospital for a few days. According to one of our mutual friends at this time, she was acting like this "because she missed me."
I was sad, angry, confused, and just overall upset. I didn't want to work things out at this point but I did still have a lot of feelings for her. But I was on the way to moving on, when finally she figured out a way back in. It'd been about two months.
That same mutual friend called me, and broke the news that they were at my friends house that she was now fucking, and that he was really drunk and hurting her and they needed me. Which was a total possibility because we all drank a ton but especially him and he did get violent.
I made the conscious decision to go help. I regret that decision every. single. day.
I went to his house where they were all at, yelled at him until he crumbled away and went into a drunken slumber. Her and I kissed to Phil Collins"In the Air Tonight" and basically made up.
Within two months she was pregnant. Now, I'm not just a complete idiot but it was kind of inevitable. She lied to me and told me she allergic to birth control. Latex (the only truthful one), the pill, the shot, literally any of it she said made her violently sick and hospitalized her in the past. This turned out to be a lie because after we had our second kid she got the shot and was fine. She also got a nuva ring and was fine.
I was 17. She was 16. There was no way it wasn't going to happen. This all kind of locked things into motion for her.
At the time my family was in agreement that she was trying to trap me and I needed to convince her to give the baby up. I didn't really believe she was trying to trap me because it was just as much my fault as hers.
I also already knew that was impossible because she wanted babies.
I still did try to tell her I didn't want a baby, I wasn't ready, she wasn't ready, she should adopt or abort. I knew I was going into the military and I probably wouldn't see either of them for long periods of time and it probably wouldn't work out.
The red flags really started to show now.
Hanging out at her house with her family showed just how angry they ALL were.
Her mom, sister, and M would get in EXPLOSIVE fights. Putting three foot wide holes in the walls. Screaming until their voices were shot. Threats of calling the police. Breaking things. Straight up actually fighting and pulling hair. She did all these things while pregnant mind you, and right in front of me.
M started to tell me things, almost a warning really, about how bad she'd treated her previous boyfriend. That she'd hit him. That she'd lied often and flirted with other guys (probably cheated too).
I quit smoking or doing anything that might be bad for the baby. Meanwhile she refused to quit smoking cigarettes or weed and smoked her entire pregnancy from start to finish. Thank the universe my son came out okay.
She wanted only new things for the baby. So I picked up a second job. I worked 75-80 hours a week at this point. I bought a new crib, clothes, rocker, basically everything on my own. I slaved away washing dishes to make sure he was going to have everything he needed and the things she wanted. According to her, I was still a dead beat piece of shit for asking her to give him up or abort, but it was whatever to me, I could understand that.
I was already in the delayed entry program for the Marines and was set to be leaving after the baby was born because I never told my recruiter she was pregnant. Well he found out from my high school counsellor that she was, and just like that I had to leave in a month or possibly might not be able to enlist because I now was going to have dependents.
So I missed my sons birth while I was training in bootcamp. I broke both my legs in training and had to spend an extra 3 months in training for recovery. She religiously wrote me letters though and I got them almost daily. We constantly talked. I didn't hear her voice for 7 months and I'd only seen a few small pictures of my son she'd sent.
So I finally got out of bootcamp and got to see her and my son and everything was great. But I don't think she quite understood what I meant by I was only going to be able to see her for 10 days.
After my 10 day boot leave was up, I had to go to communications school, for another 6 months. 3 months waiting, 3 months training. During this time she started to grow more and more distant.
I was constantly met with accusations that I was seeing other girls because I didn't always reply immediately to her messages or talk to her that much. Well I didn't have a lot to talk to her about, and I certainly wasn't flirting with any of the maybe 10 girls in the schoolhouse with 700 other guys who were competing for every second of their attention lol. I kind of started having a realization. My Dad always told me, people that are constantly afraid of having things stolen from them, are probably thiefs. Growing up, that always seemed to prove true. A lot of times, the things people claimed to fear were things that they themselves were doing. So I started to wonder. Was she really that insecure or was there more going on.
So I asked her straight up if she was cheating on me. Her response basically immediately gave her away. Immediately she got very mad and denied it all and changed the subject. That peaked my suspicion. So I pressed more and she started crying on the phone and said she'd kissed another guy and was super ashamed yada yada. I was broken. I still had the feeling she was lying because she wasn't exactly consistent in her story and it didn't make a lot of sense.
So, I went and asked her best friend/greatest enemy/my ex/her twin sister. She told me right away that she was cheating on me with a guy she worked with. That he'd come over, and hide his truck down the street just like I used to, to hide from her mom. That they'd be out there in his truck for hours. They'd sit closely together in the garage while they all smoked together (with my baby in there mind you). She said she knows her sister better than anyone, and they were fucking.
I had to accept that it was possible her sister was making some of this up because she's a big time liar as well and was also jealous that I was with her.
So I told M I had proof she'd been cheating and if she didn't come clean 100% I was going to leave and never speak to her again. She cracked and told me they had sex once but only for a few seconds and that she started crying and left. Over the next few weeks she decided to expand on that story and basically turn it into more of a sexual assault. That she didn't want it to happen and told him no and he did anyways. But they kept hanging out after the fact.
Listen I'm not one to victim blame or deny accusations or anything like that, but seriously? I'm not a fucking idiot. I knew without a doubt that was a crock of shit.
I asked for her password so I could see what they'd been saying to each other (she'd had access to mine almost the entire time we were together mind you, she constantly looked in there), and I guess maybe she thought she had time to delete the messages. Well, I guess she forgot I'm a giant fucking nerd with fast internet. I'd made a backup of all messages between them within a minute, before they disappeared and she said we never messaged on FB. They'd been flirting for months and talking extremely dirty. I never talked like that to girls. I didn't even know she was like that. I confronted her with that and she blabbered the same stories and just kept apologizing. They still worked together during all this so.. Yeah. She said she did it because she thought I was cheating on her, and that I was distant. Well, I was distant. Not only was I over a thousand miles away, I was in class or at working parties all day every fucking day. I didn't have time to talk to her. It was a job. We talked when I could. She got mad that I spent time hanging out with my new Marine friends. Whatever. She lasted longer than most girlfriends to cheat. I'm not kidding, 99% of the guys I trained with got cheated on and a Dear John letter within weeks of starting bootcamp or the school house. She had certainly beat all them.
Because I'm a fucking idiot. Because I hate being alone. And mostly, because we have a son together, I said I would forgive her but if it ever happened again I was gone.
God I'm such a fucking idiot.
So, I continued my schooling. I was already pretty fucking depressed and miserable. I'd felt great, in fact the best in my life in the time leading up to this. I'd never felt better physically or mentally than I did as junior enlisted Marine. I'd accomplished my life long goal and everything was great. Well that was short lived, and only the beginning of the SHIT I was going to go through after..
Once I got out of the schoolhouse, they told me if I wanted to live together with M and my son (We'll call him P) I had to get married. That was the ONLY way we could live together. I really really, REALLY didn't want to get married. But I wanted to be part of my sons life. I'd seen him physically like 4 times in his entire life, and only for about two weeks of time total. He was over a year old by this point. So I flew home and got married at the fucking DMV. I did get her a ring.
It was great seeing them. I picked an apartment out, she looked at them online. I bought a car. Started setting up our new home. My Mom, M, and my son drove with a uhaul with my stuff and hers to our new home about 5 states away.
We settled in, everything was great for a while.
My best friend CJ stayed at the apartment with us a lot. Sometimes while I wasn't home. She said he flirted with her and tried to fuck her. At this point I didn't even care. I was already falling out of love with her for some time. I wouldn't be surprised if they did, and I wouldn't have cared.
Regardless. Things rapidly decayed. The fights started.
The first one I vividly remember. She started texting me like crazy at work. She gotten into some boxed wine. She wasn't making any sense (I have the messages saved, they're barely a step above complete gibberish) and seemed very emotional. When I got home, I was like what the actual fuck. There was broken glass all over the floor, she was hammered out of her mind and trying to fuck me, which I wasn't interested because she couldn't even stand upright and my son was walking around in broken fucking glass crying and bleeding. I started to yell at her, so she picked up one of his toy cars that he rides on and pushes with his feet. She threw it, it was supposed to be at me. Instead, it went right at my son. It missed his head by an inch. It put a gaping hole in the wall she'd used so much force. It probably would have killed him with his soft skull. I went into a fucking rage. I went to grab my son and leave. She was closer and grabbed him first. I grabbed her neck with one hand and shoved her into the couch and took my son to his room where he could be safe. She was screaming bloody murder down stairs. When I went back down she now had armed herself with a knife and was screaming so much her voice was gone. She started to stab the counter, said she was going to kill me, and put the pointy end of the knife to my neck. It wasn't the first time somebody has put a weapon to my head or my neck, and I wasn't afraid. I said bullshit. You're gonna sit the fuck down and calm the fuck down. She started throwing dishes, smashing our coffee pot, just breaking shit. I cleaned up while she did this. Cleaned my sons feet up. Took the glass out. Swept up the glass downstairs. Restored a semblance of order to the house. She laid in bed and cried.
I have no idea what caused all that shit to this day. Maybe just the alcohol. Maybe something else. Don't know.
That day I realized what I was dealing with. I was VERY resistant to it.
Every day her control over my life started getting stronger and stronger. She texted me constantly at work, fully knowing I wasn't even allowed to have my phone in the space I worked. She would call my desk phone. If I didn't answer, she'd start calling and texting other Marines in my section or my SSgt or Sgt. I fought it. I didn't want to be accountable to her 24/7.
She started logging into my Google account to follow my timeline to see exactly where I was everyday.
At this point I already wasn't allowed to go out with my friends or go anywhere without her, so of course I never went anywhere that work didn't require me to. But there was a problem.
Google timelines wasn't a very good tool at the time. Sometimes it would show a straight line across the city to a random address. Sometimes if I was stopped at a red light for too long, it'd say I visited one of the businesses or addresses at that light. Well usually it was just random address but sometimes it might say I visited a hotel or restaurant I'd driven by.
She didn't care if it said I was there for one minute. She thought I was cheating. She also thought I could apparently travel 20+ miles in 1 second, then drive all the way back in another second. So we were fighting about that all the time.
To make matters worse, we got a new girl in my section and had I'd texted her a few times, asking about formations and work related shit because I was in charge of her and several other new Marines who I also texted. We all hung out during lunch time. Me, a several other male Marines, and her. We all would get lunch together and go to the smoke pit together to vape and shit.
Well she saw I was texting her, regardless of context, and flipped the fuck out. I wasn't allowed to have any girl friends. I wasn't allowed to talk to another girl. Even if it was for work. The fact that she'd been in my car meant I was cheating in her mind. So that spiraled the control to all new levels.
I'm being honest when I say I didn't go anywhere or do anything without her for the next two years. & she never wanted to do shit. I wanted to see the city, drink with my friends, take my son to cool places, etc. I couldn't even leave. I was trapped at home. I was trapped at work. My mental health declined deeper and deeper.
She always stalked me. She always went through my phone. I would pretend to sleep and look over to see her get my phone and dig through it for sometimes hours at night.
Whatever I had nothing to hide.
Because I'm a giant fucking idiot, I got her pregnant, again. And again, she wanted more babies. There was no chance of her not having and keeping this child. I came to terms with that. I still wasn't happy. She was upset that I wasn't happy. She wanted a pregnancy that I or any partner would be supportive of. How could be supportive of a pregnancy with a woman that every day I was learning to hate more and more?
Pregnant M is a fucking nightmare. She turns into an evil fucking woman. I'm not even kidding when she got mad, her voice would get low like a possessed person in a horror movie. She would break shit, say she was gonna kill me, the usual.
Things progressively got more violent.
She also started getting bigger. When pregnant with P, she'd put on about 70lbs and then lost it.
Well, she got pregnant with our second son, L, she put on one hundred pounds in a matter of months. She was huge. I was still my skinny 5'6 120lb self. She had me beat by 90lbs. Now when she hurt me, it actually hurt. She picked up smoking again, just for little L. If I didn't buy her cigarettes she'd go into a complete rage. She smoked almost the entire pregnancy, again. She had complications this time though and almost went into early labor a few times. Probably from stress from screaming so much at me.
Well we had L, and he's a beautiful incredible perfect boy and I love both my sons to death and would give my life for either of them. I wasn't happy when she was pregnant, but it was impossible to not be happy when I held him in my arms.
But things only got worse and worse.
Once we went on vacation. I took two weeks of leave and drove us all a thousand miles back home to see our families.
You ever had a 210lb woman punch you in the face? I have. While I was driving. With my kids in the backseat. She said I was flirting with her sister, I was already mad because she'd been talking shit to me all day when we're on vacation back home and trying to have fun. We'd just left the swimming pool. I said I wasn't flirting, I had no interest in other girls, and to stop being a bitch. So she sucker punched me while I'm driving 50 miles an hour. Thankfully, I wasn't knocked out. Just bruised. I didn't say anything. After we got to her house and her and the kids got out, I broke down and cried. I cried and cried. How did I get myself here. Why did I make the choices that brought me here.
She would shove me into walls. The floor. She'd choke me with two hands. Punch. Squeeze. Pinch.
She constantly called me a liar, an asshole, a piece of shit, so many things. I was already used to the verbal abuse. It was a daily occurence. All I did was work, pay the bills, take care of her and my kids. That's it. That's all I fucking did. She called me an alcoholic because I had (not kidding one beer a day, if that. That's the only thing that kept me fucking sane.) Eventually I wasn't allowed even that. But she smoked cigarettes and weed the whole time mind you, and drank!
Her favorite thing to do that drove me insane. She'd block doors.
Once our arguing started getting bad (which was fairly quickly), I didn't want to be there. I didn't want my kids to hear it. I didn't want to be part of it. So, I would leave. I'd go jump in my car and go for a drive to park somewhere, cool off for a while, let her cool off, then come home. She would usually blow my phone up the next hour asking where I was, saying I'm a horrible person, a piece of shit, all that. I'd get between 50-100 missed calls and a few hundred texts over an hour or two. But she would eventually calm down.
But man, she fucking HATED that. As soon as it looked like I wanted to leave, she would instantly stand in front of whatever exit was nearest. She would block the door, and shove me back in if I tried to pass.
Good thing I was fast. Usually I'd be able to sprint and make it out. She'd chase me outside screaming bloody murder, and even sit on my car to keep me from leaving. She would threaten to call the police around this time too. What for? I don't know. I hadn't done anything wrong. In fact quite the contrary, blocking doors to trap somebody is a crime. Blocking people from moving is also a crime.
The abuse only got worse.
I was in shambles by now. I was literally a shell of a man. People at work always joked about me. "Wow man you've aged like 10 years in the last 6 months." "You're 20? What the fuck? I thought you were like 32." My hairline started to recede (the only person in my entire family history this happened to). They joked about when is my wife gonna let me out. We love you, when can we see you? When can you hang out?
My best friends knew a little bit of what I was going through. I had a hard time talking to people though. Anybody in my life I've ever opened up to has betrayed me and basically taken my trust in others away, which is fine and natural really. But I was very reserved. I didn't let anybody know just how bad things really were out of fear of her, and out of my situation.
I think the snapping point where something had to change was the day I tried to leave and she grabbed my arm. She squeezed me so damn hard. Her fingernails (mind you, she bites her nails and had basically no nails at all) cut into my skin. I had bloody welts on my bicep where she squeezed me. I did manage to get away and I sat in the parking lot at my work at like 11pm with my head down. I'd already cried all my tears up long before. I sat quietly thinking. For months, after being constantly told I was the bad guy. I was the piece of shit. I was the bad husband. I was the shitty parent. I was everything wrong in her life. I sat. Quietly. I thought.
I wasn't the bad guy. I had tried to resist her control for so long, at what point did I decide to just accept it? I was sitting in my car bleeding from being squeezed so hard. I had bruises on my body. I had so little emotion left. I had nothing. She'd taken my friends away. She'd taken my life away. She crushed everything that made me who I was. I was what she wanted me to be, and it was never enough. But I was still so scared to leave. She already made so many threats. I wouldn't see my kids again. If I left she'd ruin my life. I believed it all. I didn't want to lose my kids. That's the main thing that kept me there. Finally I realized I needed to do something. I started to document everything. I took pictures of my arm. I took screenshots of thousands of messages. I installed a call recorder. I backed it all up online where she couldn't delete it. Because she would. She had before. She'd delete incriminating messages off my phone.
So, I went home. I stopped eating. I stopped talking to her. I stopped giving any fucks. I was done.
Then it happened. She probably realized she was starting to lose control. I wasn't giving a fuck what she said or did anymore.
So. June 5th 2019. I'm sitting on the toilet going poop. My 3 year old son P is in the bathtub a couple feet to my right playing in the water with his bath toys. I'm scrolling through Facebook. He's laughing and making cute kid noises. She busts into the bathroom (not exaggerating, she would slam any door and always be super aggressive) and asks why he was crying. I was confused and said he wasn't crying he was playing. She says he needs to get out of the tub right now. She says I'm doing a shitty job watching him and he could drown while I'm sitting next to him because "You're on your phone not paying attention." She'd done shit like this before plenty of times. Today, I said no though. I said he's not getting out. He's playing. He's having fun. He's not getting out of the tub until he's ready.
She started walking over to grab him. I stood up and said no. I got between them. She backed up to the door. I said no, I'm not doing this today, and you're not doing this. She blocked the entire door with her body and started berating me. I said okay I'm done, I'm leaving and I don't think I'm coming back this time. So I asked her to move. I begged. I asked and asked. Move. Move move, please move. She wouldn't. I turned my body sideways and tried to quickly squeeze by her. She grabbed me hard. One hand gripping the skin of my bicep, again. The other, my shirt. She swung me around and slammed me into the wall harder than she ever had before. Hard enough to rip the sleeve off my T-Shirt. I couldn't see for a few seconds, but I could feel her pulling me back and slamming me into the wall over and over again. My head was bouncing off the wall. My head literally put a hole in the fucking wall. She was screaming that she was gonna kill me. She was in a full on rage. It was training at this point. I wasn't even thinking, I just reacted as had been drilled into my head thousands of times by the Marine Corps. I hit her one time. It wasn't even a good hit. She was holding my bicep and my arms were down at my sides, but I was able to get a single uppercut into her stomach. She recoiled backwards in shock that I'd defended myself. She pulled her phone out and started screaming about calling the cops, I snatched it and said you want to call the fucking cops? You just beat the shit out of me? The fuck is wrong with you? And tossed her phone on the couch and left. She chased me outside but I ran fast, and peeled out of my house with the car door still open.
I didn't know what to do. I'd been here before, but I'd never hit her back. I was scared. One of my coworkers was having a little party at his apartment I'd been invited to but knew I wasn't allowed to attend. I showed up and acted like nothing was wrong. But they could tell I was fucked up. My arm was red and bruising already with three clear finger shaped bruises. I cracked. I started to tell them what was going on. They were shocked.
A few minutes later, one of them got a text from a SSgt M had called. He was asking where I was saying I needed to turn myself in immediately to the police. I called my own SSgt, explained to her what was going on. Her, my friend CJ, and I went to the police station to give my side and file my own police report.
Well since she'd already filed one, state law there said I had to go to jail.
So they cuffed me to the bench, searched me, looked me over, and listen. The cop who responded to her call was there. He walked up to me. Looked at the state I was in, and just started to apologize. He said she told them I'd beat her up. They were confused why she had no physical signs of anything. Even on her stomach. He said they put that all in the report. She was big, it's likely her fat absorbed the entire blow and it probably didn't even hurt.
He said I had to go to jail but to call him and let him know when I got out. I never did.
So I went to jail. Orleans Parish Prison. One of the top rated worst in the country. People get stabbed there daily. Drugs are done openly. People shoot heroin on their bunks. They're buddy buddy with the guards. They can get knives, guns, phones, drugs, booze, literally anything in there. It was a mad house. My first 10 minutes there a guy got stabbed in the neck with a broken broom handle. I kept to myself mostly except for talking to some of the older guys who shared a lot of wisdom with me about how they'd been trapped by the system and prison was their lives.I had some time to think about how fucked I was. I had some time to think about just how far my mental state had gone. I really believed for so long I was the bad guy. Everything was my fault. It was my fault she cheated on me. It was my fault she was depressed. She even convinced me it was my fault she couldn't lose any weight.
The judge set my bail. My lawyer even showed up pro bono to speak on my behalf. My Gunny showed up to look out for me. Everybody was there for me. The other inmates next to me asked if those were my people and I said they sure are.
You know who else was there? M. She looked at me from across the court room. She looked at me chained at the wrists and ankles to a bench like a fucking animal in an orange jumpsuit. I looked at her, and I gave her the dirtiest fucking look I could muster. She just looked down at the ground and shook her head.
The judge set my bail and my Mom paid it remotely.
I was free. But it was just the beginning. Over the next few weeks I'd have to tell and re-tell this story to my command. The Sergeant fucking Major. My Major. My Master Sergeant. Counsellors on base. Everybody. I wasn't allowed to go home at all. They put me in a room on base. For the first time in like 4 years. I sat down and could actually breathe. I didn't have to worry about upsetting her. I didn't have to worry about shit except for seeing my kids.
The command said neither of us were allowed to communicate with each other while they figured shit out. Perfect. If she contacted me, she'd be in trouble. Perfect.
I was required to attend counselling on base. I also was required to take a class on how to stop being an abuser. It was pretty ironic. They went over all the signs of abuse and red flags. She hit every single one of them. Every. Single. One. I didn't even realize half the shit she'd been doing to manipulate me.Gaslighting. Manipulation. Victim blaming. Lying. Cheating. Hitting. Choking. Threatening. Emotional. Physical. Everything.
That encouraged me. I told the counsellors everything. Three people sat in a room and listened to me talk for almost 8 hours. They asked me questions. Went over the story over and over. They took notes, they'd be presenting this information to my command to make a decision on my punishment or what should happen to me.
I showed the messages. The pictures. A counsellor who'd been helping people for two decades with PTSD/combat veterans cried listening to my story. I laid everything out. Every single incident I could remember. They asked for specific details. I gave everything. Everything I did wrong, everything she did. I went back to my new barracks room and slept for like 14 or 15 hours. I hadn't slept good in years.
The command didn't want either of us near each other which was perfect. I had to communicate to her through my Staff Sergeant. I wanted her out of the house. Keeping the kids with me there was an impossibility unfortunately. I didn't make enough money to afford daycare or have anybody that could reliably watch them everyday that I worked. I knew I'd be able to see them again soon, and we arranged a meeting so I could see the kids for a while before they left back home. I even paid for the budget truck her and her friend could drive all our shit back.
My command decided to not do anything to me except require I go to counselling on base regularly.
Finally, she was gone but not out of my life.
She left a really nice letter for me and she messaged me every day for months. Begging me to forgive her. Saying all the dirty things she'd do to me and everything else she could think of. I just saved the messages and said we're done. I had about a year left in the Marines. I did a 7 month extension so I could figure my life situation out.
Finally I got to hang out with my friends. I got to be social. I got to go out and see the city I'd seen none of despite living there for almost 3 years. We had awesome parties. I made great memories. I saw and talked to other girls that were actually normal. Done with actual relationships though, probably forever. Everything was pretty great. The district attorney dropped my case immediately at my first court appearance. My mom got the bail money back. I was totally free.
Meanwhile she was still bugging me. Her Mom even now too. Her family and friends calling/texting me saying they were gonna beat my ass and I'm such a piece of shit yada yada. They only knew what she told them so I don't blame them. I get it. I didn't care. I would just reply that they only know half the story. It's funny, while she's telling them all I'm a scummy shit human being to protect her story, she's texting me saying she wants to fuck me.
I asked her one day, why'd she lie to the cops? For some reason, she just said "I don't know why I did"Admitted to lying to cops, check.
She had to get a job and her Mom was going to kick her out for being crazy at her house too.So I had to start paying child support. Of which, 90% or more was spent on cigarettes and weed.
She got an apartment with her best friend since elementary school. Her friend lasted a few months before she had to leave because M kept calling her a thief (because she's unorganized and lost things all the time) and a bitch and other mean shit until she couldn't handle it, despite the fact she was watching our kids for free almost every single day. They're not friends anymore at all.
She got a new roommate. A guy from highschool we knew who'd just gotten out of prison. He lasted maybe a month before leaving. He said fuck that shit too. She was a worse roommate than guys he was in prison with, he called me to vent and talk shit about her for a few hours. Said he couldn't imagine what she did to me. He said that all she did was say how shitty I was but he didn't really believe it all, and after a while realized it was all bullshit.
Now, she's got her best friend from high school living with her. We'll see how long that lasts.
She's very good at getting people to think she's this sweet, shy, innocent, quiet girl. That's the girl I fell in love with when I was 15. She was all of those things. She was beautiful.Until you live with her and start seeing her a lot. She talks shit about every single person in her life. Her family. She calls her mom and step dad abusers and molesters with no evidence or reason. She called her manager who'd literally give the shirt off her back a piece of shit all the time, even though she gave her a job, supported her, and drove miles out her way to give her free rides every day.
There is nobody who is good enough for her. There is nobody who can meet her standards.
And guess what? Karma is a fucking bitch.
I can't help but think about how misfortunate her life has been since she moved. Both of her cats, her prized possessions were killed after she left her window open for ages without ever fixing a barely attached window screen. Of course they got out. Her cat of like 8 years was decapitated by an owl or a hawk, all they found was his head. The other cat, got out and was probably run over. They disposed of her before M could see her. Sad thing is, I loved those cats. I'm the one who took care of them 99% of the time. At one point she had THIRTEEN fucking cats in my house against my will. 8 shelter kittens at once. I took care of all of them. Feeding. Litter. Medicine. Cleaning their shit and piss off the floor every day after work. I'd say no more kittens or strays, she'd get more while I was at work. I couldn't do shit about it.
Her apartment started having serious issues. Not only was it destroyed because she lets the kids do whatever they want, it started to break down. The dishwasher flooded it all once. The carpet got moldy, the place smelled like total shit. Never really got better.Then it happened again, but the second time, it destroyed everything. They had to rip the entire kitchen out, dig a 7 foot trench in there, fix a pipe underground, and replace everything.
Her roommates and friends abandoned her. Her family all but did as well except because she'd threaten to not let them see our kids, they maintain a relationship.
Her fishtank, (basically mine that'd I'd religiously taken care of years, with lots of beautiful fish) got cloudy/moldy and all the fish died and everything rotted within weeks of me returning it to her like she asked.
Her car has been breaking left and right, costing thousands.
She got a warrant for her arrest after not paying a failure to stop ticket.
Everything that could go wrong for her, would go wrong.
The new guys she'd been fucking with gave her an STD and dipped out on her, which she cried to me about on the phone.
I'm sad about the cats and fish, but the universe is paying her back.
So of course, now I'm back home. I watch my kids 5 days a week or more. Unfortunately, I can't get any of the jobs I'm qualified for because the whole incident put a flag on my Secret clearance and I can't work for the government anymore pretty much. So that sucks. But I've got a great home. A great roommate and friend. My family to talk to and support. I'm looking for a civilian IT job.
So of course she sees this all. & she's mad about me being okay now. She's mad that she lives in a shitty gross apartment. She's mad that she's working a shitty dead end job. She's mad the kids are happier with me. She's mad that I look and sound happy. So she's probably been looking for ways to fuck me over and she found her chance.
I spanked my kid one day like 10 minutes before she picked them up after she got off work, and of course she literally inspects them after picking them up (she's done this type of thing for years. She looks at their buttholes to make sure her mom or step dad/etc didn't rape them. That's her train of thought.) She saw reddish mark on his butt cheek where I spanked him, and called the police. She told them I was beating my kids and they were bruised. I guess she didn't think they'd go actually check out her claims..? So the cops just called me, asked for my side, then told me they went out there to check on them and they didn't see anything on them at all, and to watch out and to call them if she messes with me again or file charges against her for lying and libeling me.
Sure I've said my fair share of mean shit to her. Sure, I'm not always right. I'm not perfect. I've messed up too. But I never cheated. I never abused her. I took care of them all for years. I didn't deserve any of that shit and nobody else does.If you're going through this shit. I have some advice.TAKE ACTION FIRST. Don't believe the bullshit. The first person to take action is the winner. Had I gone to the police first, she'd be in prison, and I'd have a badass job right now and full custody of my kids. Instead I still have to deal with her shit and she STILL tries to manipulate me. Still tries to get in my pants. Still bugs me. Still talks shit to me. Still tries to fuck me over.
So fun times. I'm still miserable. Still depressed. Still confused about who the fuck I even am I anymore. Still doing mental gymnastics trying to figure out shit. That's why I wrote this out. When I lay it all out like this, it's so easy for me to see through the manipulation. It still fucks with me though. It's been like two years. I'm still so broken, but I've come a very long way from where I was at. I'll never, & I mean never, fall in love again. I have no desire to. I'm way too jaded now. I'm a bitter asshole inside. I don't show that emotion or any of that to other people, but I know that's who I am inside right now. I have too many issues to be in a healthy relationship. She'll put her problems on her partners. I won't do that. I won't ever let myself hurt somebody. I don't want anybody to feel the shit that I feel. If I didn't have my kids, family, and friends that loved me, I wouldn't be writing this. I'd have put a bullet through my brain years ago. Do yourself a favor. Look out for the red flags. Trust your gut and not your penis or vagina. If things are looking kinda sketchy or weird, just leave. Don't look back. They'll come crying to you, and that's when you know they're busted inside. Don't fall for it. Easy for me to say now, but when I was a young teenager, the thought of having a pretty and sweet girlfriend who loved sex was enough for me to ignore everything. Hindsight's always 20/20. Good luck.

Discord Name: maritime#5500
Name and House: Rhaenyra Targaryen
Age: 37
Cultural Group: Valyrian
Appearance: Rhaenyra Targaryen has chest-length platinum hair, angled eyebrows, deep-set indigo eyes, an upturned nose, full lips, and a wide jawline. Her complexion is pale and slowly aging, with bags under her eyes and smiles lines between her cheeks. She stands at 5'7'' with a large bust and a full figure from several births. Remarkably, she bears few stretch marks
Gift(s): Fugitive
Skill(s): Daggers (o), Beastmaster (e), Scribe, Alchemy
Talent(s): Exquisite High Valyrian, Singing, Swimming
Negative Trait: N/A
Starting Title: Princess of Dragonstone
Starting Location: Harrenhal
Alternate Characters: Lyra Volmark (Forfeited)

Biography

Childhood

Daeron and then Rhaenyra were born in 178 AC the eldest children to Queen Daenaerys Targaryen and her uncle-husband, Rhaegar Velaryon. Split from birth, Rhaenyra did not have to share with Daeron the crib or their mother's attention. She soaked up the latter like a sponge, fast becoming the future queen's favorite, only to lord that fact over Daeron after Rhaegar returned the infant boy to his mother's care. As the twins grew into adolescents, she went on to boast of things he did not have, like her first dog, Balerion, or of things that were originally his, like his friends. Bayard Tyrell was one such friend, whom she kept closer than the rest.
As hard as Rhaenyra tried to throw slights Daeron's way, he received nearly all of them with grace. She presumed it was his confidence as the heir to the throne that kept him calm, which only drove her to terrorize him further. It was not until they were locked in the royal nursery together, with their father, their infant siblings, and the Shivers between them, that the elder twins reconciled. Daeron told her with his dying breath that, despite her unrelenting ire, he had always loved her. His death, followed closely by their father's, killed the girl inside her. It was all she could do to mimic Daeron's example and care for her siblings as the bodies in the room began to bloat.
The living Targaryens broke their quarantine in 193 AC. Rhaenyra emerged a hardened but broken woman, scarred by a harrowing couple weeks she would never forget. Everything her brother had, she gained, including Dragonstone. It was all she had ever wanted but at too high a cost. When Bayard attempted to console her, she froze him out, seeing him as just another one of Daeron's things that never ought to have been hers in the first place.

Young Adulthood

Eager to escape the site of her trauma, Rhaenyra traversed the realm in 194 AC on the first of many royal progresses to come. She made visit to Gulltown, Riverrun, Lannisport, Pyke, and Old Wyk. To her delight, her hosts succeeded at mollifying her. She was treated best in the Iron Islands, where she feasted every night during her stay. They even taught her how to swim. On the last day of her stay, Lord Regnar Drumm gifted her an Ironborn ship, which she named Prince Daeron Targaryen. She returned upon its planks to King's Landing in much higher spirits than when she had left.
Waiting for her in King's Landing was a bastard child by the name of Daemon Waters, who had been birthed upon her mother and sired by her cousin once-removed, Baelor Targaryen, the "Bastardmaker" as she would later dub him. Seeing a chance to repent for her childhood sins, she took Daemon into her care as their mother turned his back on him. Though Rhaenyra would never call him her son, she would raise him as her own.
With Daemon in tow, Rhaenyra controversially retreated to Dragonstone for a year. In secret, she wished to learn ancient, arcane arts, arts that would help her protect her loved ones from the Stranger, regardless of his form. After being threatened and intimidated by her, Maester Duncan taught her what he knew of potions from the citadel.
Bayard's true feelings for Rhaenyra became apparent to her in the final years of the second century. He went on to name her Queen of Love of Beauty not once, not twice, but three times in the span of five years. Still, she did not think it right by her late brother to reciprocate the young Rose's love. Instead, she chose a handsome, chivalrous knight by the name of Owen Costayne to be her husband. With him, she found a love so deep it filled the void in her heart, not to mention her womb. In 196 AC, the year of their marriage, she painstakingly produced a set of twins, Aegon and Aella. Another set, Visenya and Valarr, came in 197 AC. After her troubled deliveries, it was said she had nearly beaten a serving girl to death for having suggested the princess might die in labour. The childbearing sprint had indeed taken a large, almost fatal toll on her. She was convinced to adopt a withdrawal policy with her husband, lest she withdraw from their bed altogether.
Rhaenyra and Owen were uncompromising with their children. Rearing them was a perpetual exercise in trial and error. With Aegon, the most docile of his siblings, they stressed the severity of his future obligations while pushing him to adopt his tutors' martial habits. He resisted doing either. To win him over to their set curriculum, she sometimes sang to him, but such tricks lost their potency as he matured. With Aella, every day was a battle and everything she disliked was an enemy. She broke septas as if they were made of straw, forcing Rhaenyra to have a personal, albeit harsh hand in her daughter's tutelage. Opposite to Aegon and Aella, Visenya internalized her parents' expectations, stressing often about meeting them even if she already had. Rhaenyra did nothing to discourage Visenya's perfectionism and even encouraged it at times. For this reason, and for seeing herself in her daughter, she considered Visenya her favorite. Valarr was very much his father's son and took to knightly pursuits like he was born for it. Conversely, he lacked his mother's wits despite her best efforts to instill them in him.
Of all the children in her care, Daemon Waters had it the easiest. She did not impose upon him the same diktats. Only later in life did she appreciate the merits of this approach.
The humdrum of child rearing did not distract Rhaenyra from her obligations as the Princess of Dragonstone. Between 202 and 207 AC, she and Owen went on seven progresses to consolidate her right to rule. Their first one was through the Riverlands, where they stayed with Lord Oswald Tully and enjoyed his overwhelming magnanimity. They had the opposite experience in the Westerlands, where they chaffed under Lann Lannister's abrasiveness. In 203 AC, they travelled the Dornish Marches and the Reach, where they braved Dornish assassination attempts. In response, Rhaenyra formed the Wyverns, a group of armed ladies-in-waiting. In 205 AC, the royal couple attended Lord Matthos Arryn's 60th nameday tournament, then progressed through the Vale and the North. In 206 AC, the couple visited the Iron Islands, marking Rhaenyra's second, much more serious visit there. In addition to exploring every major island, she and Dagon had pointed conversations about Ironborn grievances. A second visit on the way back to King's Landing was also extended to Oswald due to his sheer generosity. When all was said and done in 207 AC, she, Owen, and their children took a two-moon reprieve in Oldtown to recuperate from their trials.

Adulthood

Daenaerys recalled Rhaenyra to King's Landing in preparation for the Conquest of Dorne. Owen, for his part, opted to join the fighting men when the war started in earnest. He survived its opening years, fought many battles in the hellish sands, but died on Sunspear's steps in 210 AC. His loss, the loss of her brother, Viserys, and the collapse of her mother's mental fortitude reopened the old void in her heart. It would have put her in a similar state were it not for the seventeen years she had spent hardening herself for such a moment. When she was delivered the news, she swallowed it bitterly and simply said "I understand." She gave the same answer to the Small Council when they asked her to assume the regency of the realm.
Far more than children, Rhaenyra had grown fond of breeding dogs, most of whom descended from Balerion. She wept among them on her hardest days without Owen. Syrax, Meleys, and Moondancer, the best trained of the group but also the most empathetic, grew to become her favorites.
Owen's passing pushed Rhaenyra closer to her children, who all reeled from it in their own ways. She made common cause with Aegon over his future, cowed Aella into a tenuous détente, guided Visenya through her mysterious dreams, and helped Valarr improve his letters. For each set of twins, she hosted extravagant feasts to mark their entry into young adulthood, first in King's Landing and then on Driftmark, her father's birthplace. In 214 AC, she sent each child on their own progress, so that like her, they might come to appreciate the gravity of their royal obligations.
The induction of Maitland Pyke, the first Ironborn to join the Queensguard, stood out as one of her queerer regal decisions. A clear statement to all that she favored the Iron Islands. She gave him the purple cloak and assigned him to her detail, keeping him close for the duration of her rule.
The single largest challenge of her regency was the Festival of Lannisport in 212 AC. The reasons for the sacking were not lost on Rhaenyra, who sympathized with the Ironborn's position. Still, Lann Lannister and his ilk cried for justice, as did Arthur Crane and the Small Council. She set aside Dagon's explanatory letter and demanded he hand over his ill-gotten gains along with the men responsible for the attack. She lamented that Regnar Drumm counted among them, and offered personal condolences to his son, Victarion, after the executions. But in the end, an all but certain war under her rule was averted. As a proven conciliator, the kingdom could no longer doubt her candidacy for the throne.
The remaining years of her regency saw Rhaenyra consolidate the royal court around her. To do so, she relied on unsavory connections, on herself at times to skulk, or on forgeries written in her mother's hand. She went on a progress through the Westerlands, but ended it early after Lann levied a sensitive insult against her. For her entire rule, she wore mourning blacks.

215 AC

Like an old bear out of hibernation, Daenaerys emerged from her isolation a husk of her former self, yet still ready to rule. She offered little thanks to Rhaenyra for her efforts, which drove a fresh wedge between them. A royal progress was called, with Harrenhal as their first stop.
At Harrenhal, Rhaenyra sat on her fresh misgivings, put on a good face for most, and a sour face for some. All night, she drank. After catching wind of Daeron's newly consummated affair with Seraena Celtigar, Rhaenyra fell into a drunken rage). Plated to the nines with a small army behind her, she accepted Ser Davos Celtigar's invitation to parley on the shore of the God's Eye. Despite his extreme attempt at placating her for his wife's mistake and his subsequent attempt at making peace with her, she deliriously claimed to everyone present that he had tried to assassinate her. A small slaughter ensued. The night ended when Rhaenyra showed up at her mother's door, crazed and covered in blood.

Timeline

178 AC: Daeron Targaryen and Rhaenyra Targaryen are born to Daenaerys Targaryen and Rhaegar Velaryon
190 AC: King Jaehaerys II Targaryen dies. Daenaerys ascends to the Iron Throne
193 AC: Rhaegar and Daeron die of the Shivers. Rhaenyra becomes the Princess of Dragonstone
194 AC: Rhaenyra attends her first royal progress, visiting Gulltown, Riverrun, Lannisport, Pyke, and Old Wyk. Princess Rhaenyra dubs Baelor Targaryen the “Bastardmaker” for siring Daemon Waters
195 AC: Bayard Tyrell, Rhaenyra's longtime friend, names her Queen of Love and Beauty at the Tourney of King’s Landing
196 AC: Rhaenyra chooses Ser Owen Costayne as her husband and marries him in Oldtown. Bayard names Rhaenyra Queen of Love and Beauty for a second time at her wedding tournament. After a troublesome pregnancy, Rhaenyra births a set of twins, Aegon and Aella
197 AC: Proving as fertile as her mother before her, Rhaenyra births her second set of twins, Visenya and Valarr
200 AC: Bayard names Rhaenyra Queen of Love and Beauty for a third time at the Tourney of Duskendale
202 AC: Rhaenyra and Owen lead a royal progress through the Riverlands and the Westerlands
203 AC Rhaenyra and Owen go on another royal progress through the Dornish Marches and the Reach
205 AC: Rhaenyra and Owen attend the 60th nameday tourney of Lord Matthos Arryn at the Gates of the Moon, and lead a royal progress across the Vale of Arryn. Later, the royal pair lead a second royal progress to the North
206 AC: Continuing their royal progress of the previous year, Rhaenyra and Owen lead a royal progress through the Iron Islands and then back to King’s Landing via the Riverlands
207 AC: After seven progresses in five years, Rhaenyra, Owen, and their children take two moons in Oldtown to recuperate
208 AC: The Crown invades Dorne in an attempt to finally complete the Conquest. Owen joins the front lines
210 AC: Near the end of the war, Owen dies near Sunspear. Rhaenyra suppresses the tragedy and assumes the regency after her mother falls into a black grief over the deaths of Prince Viserys Targaryen and King Consort Durran Dondarrion
211 AC: Rhaenyra names Maitland Pyke to the Queensguard
212 AC: Rhaenyra throws a lavish nameday celebration in King's Landing to mark the age of majority of her eldest twins. The Ironborn attack Lannisport in what comes to be known as the Slaughter of Lannisport. Princess Rhaenyra orders Lord Greyjoy hand over to Casterly Rock those responsible for the raid. Lord Regnar Drumm and several other captains and commanders are executed
213 AC: Rhaenyra throws another lavish nameday celebration for her second pair of twins on Driftmark
214 AC: Rhaenyra sends her children on their own royal progresses. Aegon travels to the Riverlands, the Iron Islands, and the Westerlands. Aella travels to the North. Visenya travels to the Vale of Arryn. Valarr travels to the Reach.
215 AC: Daenaerys reassumes her place on the Iron Throne and announces a great royal progress, with the first great stop being Harrenhal. Princess Rhaenyra Targaryen attends the festivities at Harrenhal. In an alcohol-induced rage, she slaughters Ser Davos Celtigar, his Essosi wife, and their maester

House Targaryen

In lieu of the traditional appendix format (WIP), see the Family Echo.

Supporting Characters

Bellena Bar Emmon - Wyvern - Tourney Knight Cerenna Corbray - Wyvern - Marksman Lyra Dustin - Wyvern - Warrior (Axe) Maester Duncan - Maester - Scholar Aella Targaryen - Daughter - Huntsman Syrax, Meleys, Moondancer - her three black dogs, with Syrax as a wolf - T2 Animal

I put together this extremely long list of tips, stuff we do/don't like, etc. for my best friend recently. It's kind of a lot and may not all be relevant to everyone's needs, but hopefully some of it will be useful to some of you. I found these types of posts super helpful when I was pregnant and planning, so I figure since I've done the work of putting it together, I might as well share the love with you all, dear internet strangers <3 As with anything pregnancy/birth/baby related, YMMV, these are just my opinions and observations so far.
We had our son River in March. We had planned on an unmedicated birth with a doula, laboring at home before delivering at a hospital, but that wasn't in the cards for us. River was breech, and ended up being born unexpectedly via emergency c-section and spending time in the NICU. (Birth story here if you're interested.) Some of what I've included is specific to that type of birth.
Most of the stuff we got was hand me downs, and new stuff came mostly as gifts from Amazon. I've tried to link to non-Amazon sources for things because fuck Jeff Bezos, but know that they are available there if that's what works better for you.
BOOKS
Like a Mother - really enjoyed this one
Expecting Better - really useful info. helped a lot with decision making
Cribsheet - can be read later on since it's mostly post-birth stuff, same author as Expecting Better
The Birth Partner - this would be for a partner to read, if it fits with your birth plan/philosophy
Ina May's Guide to Childbirth - didn't finish it, mostly read the birth stories, liked it
Happiest Baby On The Block - not worth buying, got it from library, but nice to skim
Parenting Beyond Pink and Blue - about raising kids without gender stereotypes - enjoying so far, except that sometimes the author conflates sex and gender which is a big pet peeve for me
Boys: What It Means To Become A Man - bought this, haven’t read any of it. I think it’s about addressing toxic masculinity in parenting
No Bad Kids - I didn’t finish reading it (library) but I might try it again
Babywise - didn't care for this one so much, just seemed stress inducing so I didn't finish it or follow its guidelines. Friends really liked it. It's basically advice on getting your baby on a sleep schedule super early on
Go Diaper-Free - just got this this week - it's about elimination communication (EC). I'm going to try out some of the techniques soon with River but it has advice on reducing the reliance on diapers from birth. Everyone I know who's done EC with their kids swears by it.
WHILE PREGNANT
Pregnancy pillow: made sleeping so much more comfortable. Also was sort of like a straight jacket that kept me from moving in my sleep (I’m not a natural side sleeper) and made a giant pillow wall between me and Mike (husband), but so comfy. I felt like style and shape is a personal preference. I had a “C” shaped one. I think I started using it around 14 weeks or so.
Support belt: I got this one in the event one of my ECVs worked to hold the baby in place, but none were successful. Some people use it just for comfort but because River was breech I didn’t use it because I didn’t want to hold him in the wrong position, plus I was never very uncomfortable.
Clothes: shop the holiday weekend sales on Old Navy online. They don’t carry a lot of maternity items in stores, and they’re pretty decent and the sales make them cheap. Beware that almost no pregnancy jeans have front pockets. But some (not all) Old Navy ones do. Motherhood Maternity is overpriced for the quality, though I did get a few office appropriate dresses from there that were also nursing dresses, so they look good when you’re not pregnant later. I had two pairs of pregnancy leggings (over the bump) that were handed down that I wore a ton towards the end.
I had wanted an unmedicated birth, which meant I also wanted to test negative for group b strep (you get tested around 35 weeks I think) so that I wouldn’t need antibiotics. I took a specific probiotic and swallowed raw garlic daily starting around 32 weeks, which can help kill the bacteria if you have it. It didn’t work for me, but I would do it again and start sooner (maybe around 25 weeks) next time.
For the last month and a half, I went to a Webster trained chiropractor and an acupuncturist who specialized in pregnancy. Both were amazing. I was going to them to try and flip River head down, but I think if I were to be pregnant again with a non-breech baby, I’d do both again anyway. Super relaxing, helped with being more comfortable and mobile. I also went a few times for Mayan abdominal massage, which was also supposed to help with flipping. It was lovely, but of the three treatments, is probably the one I could see foregoing in the future.
Also prenatal yoga and stretching were actually super helpful. My back and hips would sometimes hurt in the night and so I would do pigeon pose and some butterfly stretches when I got up to pee. Helped a lot. And walking a lot especially towards the end. I think staying mobile helped my back while I was pregnant and made me recover from surgery faster. I also did guided meditation and breathing exercises that were hypnobirthing based.
LABOR
FridaMom gown: so I didn’t labor, but this was nice to have at the hospital for sleeping in and it is breastfeeding friendly. I use it as pajamas now.
FridaMom c-section underwear: if you end up needing a planned cesarean, these undies are so much more comfortable than the hospital ones they give you. Those are a wedgie waiting to happen. I ordered these from Target.
FridaMom makes a bunch of other recovery specific to vaginal delivery, but I didn’t try any of it.
Definitely take everything (pads, undies, peribottle, diapers, wipes, etc) from the hospital and don’t be shy asking for extras. The nurses don’t care.
Stuff for you to bring to the hospital:

• Your own pillow and a pillow for partner
  
• Cozy socks
  
• Water bottle(s) ideally with straw or squeeze top
  
• Toiletries (soap shampoo toothpaste deodorant etc)
  
• Chap stick
  
• Hair ties
  
• SNACKS: we brought snack bars, jerky, and trail mix. I had packed these way in advance which I highly recommend doing so you can just grab and go. Honestly I think the snacks were the most important thing we brought to the hospital.
  
• Change(s) of clothes for your partner - easy to forget but they're (most likely) sleeping over too!
  
• Comfy pants - I ordered some c-section friendly stuff from target in advance (2 pairs of these, 2 pairs of these, 1 pair of these that was either high waisted or had a drawstring that could make it high waisted. These would work for vaginal delivery too. I still wear these pants most days
  
• 2-3 breastfeeding shirts (I got bunch of clothes from this brand - the short sleeved version of this shirt, and a few dresses) and bras (links below)
  
• Extra long phone charger cables and plugs
  
• I liked having crocs as my shoes there. Easy on and off, could be worn in the shower. I also packed slippers but crocs with cozy socks were enough
  
• A robe if you’re a robe person. Helps make you feel more cozy afterwards.
  
• Breastfeeding pillow if you’re going to be using one
  
• Nipple cream
  
• Breast pads (I didn’t bring these but wish I had for leaks -see below for more info)
  
• Lactation cookies
  

Take whatever drugs they give you for recovery, and take them on time (i.e. if you can re-dose every 6 hours, do it every 6 hours (not every 7 or 8 or 9)). I was prescribed extra strength Tylenol and Advil, as well as oxy for pain. I took all of them on schedule the whole 4 days I was in the hospital, and then when I got home, I didn’t need the oxy any more but I took the Tylenol and Advil religiously for a full week. I set alarms around the clock. It helped me to remind myself that they don’t give out medals for making it through pain or discomfort without taking drugs, so I should just take them. It’s easy to forget or to think you’ll just be fine. It's also so much easier to prevent the pain before it bothers you than to try and reduce it after it starts. I think this applies regardless if it’s an incision or your vagina that’s hurting.
BREASTFEEDING
My Brest Friend pillow: super comfy and easy to position the baby on.
Boppy pillow: no fucking clue how this is supposed to help breastfeeding. Apparently once the baby can sit up you can use it to prop them, but it is not helpful to us yet.
Motherlove nipple cream: doesn’t have to be washed off before baby eats, has no lanolin, and is really nice to put on before pumping if you have to do any of that. I got like 4 of these so I could have one by the bed, one next to the pump, one in the NICU, etc. I love it. When I remember to, I put it on after showering and before bed too.
Lanolin nipple cream: kind of hard to put on, and sticky and weird. Stains clothes. Dislike.
Bamboobies washable breast pads: soft, comfy pads for leaks - very necessary especially at the beginning. They seemed expensive when I bought them but I am now very glad I did.
Haaka pump: I’ve used it a couple times and am just about to introduce it more regularly to my routine. Everyone who has one loves it intensely, so I’m assuming that once I start using it more often, I’ll have a more concrete positive opinion. It’s definitely easier than a pump-pump. The Haaka I got also had a lid.
Nursing bras: I wear nursing bras 100% of the time now. I sleep in them, I wear them all day. Boobs are bigger when they're full of milk, and they leak, and having a bra on keeps them more comfortable and allows me to wear pads. Before I gave birth, I had stopped wearing nice bras (for like, the last 2 years or so) that were actually sized correctly to fit me, and was only wearing wire free stretchy ones that I got at Target. Technically the ones that I had been getting had straps that would work for breastfeeding, but my boobs grew so they don't fit right now.
So for nursing I got these, which are comfy and easy. They're nice for sleep. Only thing is that bigger boobs can kind of fall out of them, and sometimes I find that my nipple has slipped out from behind the bra part, which isn't really an issue unless there's friction or I'm leaking.
I also got these ones, which are my favorite. Comfortable enough to sleep in, and they do a better job of keeping things all up in there.
LACTATION COOKIES
Do these work? I'm not totally sure. I started eating them while we were still in the hospital, and had no trouble with supply (which seems kind of amazing to me considering I didn't start pumping until 2 days after birth, had no skin to skin with River for his first 4 days of life, and couldn't even try breastfeeding directly until he was about a week old). Did the cookies make that happen? I don't know. Is it nice to have a bag full of cookies that are all mine and not having to feel guilty about not sharing? Absolutely. For that reason, I suggest getting a few. If nothing else, they're a nice snack.
Booby boons in caramel crunch: always seem a little stale but very tasty
Mommy knows best in oatmeal chocolate rainbow cookie: a little weird but tasty and big. This brand also sells mixes to make cookies or brownies. I also made their brownie mix and they were delicious. Also the best part honestly was not having to share :)
Nourisher lactation bars in chocolate banana: actually gross. Weird texture and banana tastes chemical-y even though it’s all natural. Yuck
OTHER BOOB STUFF
My nipples definitely hurt the first few weeks but it gets better and goes away. I liked these Booby Tubes which can be microwaved or frozen for relief. I also tried these gel pads. They didn’t seem to make much of a difference but it was nice at the time to have some protection against friction. I got these too but haven't needed them yet.
Definitely ask to meet with a lactation consultant at the hospital. They can evaluate your baby's latch, help you with positioning, and give you tips for a feeding or pumping schedule once you're home. Also remember and remind yourself that it can be hard, and that's ok, and it doesn't work for everyone or every baby and that's ok too!
BOTTLE FEEDING
We supplemented with pumped milk (i.e. I'd breastfeed him, then we'd have a bottle of prepared breastmilk ready that I had pumped earlier to make sure he was getting enough) when River first came home so we had some bottle stuff ready to go. It seems like some babies develop a preference for a specific bottle while other will drink from anything. River was more the latter, though we thought that maybe the Lansinoh bottles seemed better? Not really sure any more why.
Lansinoh bottles: easy to clean, didn’t seem to cause a ton of spit up
Comotomo bottles: hard to unscrew because the bottom is silicone, but otherwise good
Dr. Browns bottles: entirely too many pieces to wash and assemble. This is what they used in our NICU
Mam anti-colic bottles: we got one free as a sample. These also have too many parts so they’re annoying to clean and assemble
Pump: Because River was unable to feed directly from the breast right away, I qualified for a rental of a hospital grade pump. They gave me a Medela Symphony. At the hospital, I was using an Ameda pump that was huge, attached to a rolling stand. I liked that the Ameda one showed elapsed time, but that was really the only thing I liked better about it. It might be worth asking your doctor or your insurance plan if you'd qualify for a hospital grade rental pump if pumping is something you're interested in.
Sanitizer:
Avent: doesn’t dry. Got this as a hand-me-down. We thought this was fine but it wasn’t. We needed drying.
Papablic: dries. Takes longer but much better.
DIAPERING
Butt paddle: so nice! No creams all over your hands!!
SkipHop changing mat: we use this on top of our changing pad and cover because it’s waterproof and more easily wiped down. It’s great for travel. Even when travel just means the living room floor instead of the changing pad.
If you have a boy, their pee goes everywhere, it is insane. The penis needs to be covered at all times, which is tricky. We keep a stack of shop rags from Costco (which is also what we use for burp cloths - HIGHLY RECOMMEND) on hand, fold them to fit between his legs, and wedge them there while we wipe and put cream on. He goes through a million of them. He will pee, then a minute later pee again. You’re never safe. There is always pee waiting to go everywhere. Like in his eye! Or mouth! I’m sure girls have lots of pee too, but it doesn’t travel in the same way.
Diaper cream: River got a rash that was really hard to get rid of so we literally panic-ordered $80 worth of creams online to try and figure out the best one. We got:
Sensicare: what they used in the NICU. Effective, but very hard to clean off and expensive. You go through a tube quite quickly.
Desitin: kind of whatever. Didn’t do the trick for us.
Bordeaux’s butt paste: smells weird.
Triple paste: expensive, but worked best for us ultimately
Triderma: too thin in consistency, like a lotion.
Aquaphor baby diaper paste: fine, but didn’t make it disappear. Annoying to get out of the tube.
When he doesn’t have a rash we use Aquaphor baby ointment (basically Vaseline). We also use this to moisturize his skin. If/when his diaper rash flares up, we use the triple paste until it’s gone.
BABY CLOTHES
FUCK SNAPS!!!!!!!!!!!! Seriously fuck snaps. Any full body outfit that snaps all the way down or around the legs is garbage. Do you want to try to line up 25 snaps at 3am in the dark when you haven’t slept more than an hour and a half consecutively for a week? No, you don’t. All zippers, all the time.
Also, pro tip: if you are a paranoid person (a.k.a. a parent) and sometimes need to confirm that they are in fact ok by watching them breathe in their sleep, it's way easier to see their chest/belly rise and fall in the dark if they're wearing a patterned pajama than is it with a solid colored one.
Zutano slippers: these are the only things that stay on baby feet. They seem expensive, but you just need 1 pair per size (just start with the 0-3month ones and if you like them you could get bigger ones later), and literally zero baby socks. Don’t bother with the socks, they fall off every 10 minutes. They’re adorable but pointless. There's also knock off versions on Amazon
No clothing sizes are consistent, not even within the same brand. It is very confusing. River was simultaneously wearing size newborn and 6-9month Gerber onesies at one point. Like, they shouldn’t both fit.
Swaddles: we got these, but he busts out of them easily because they’re just a touch too big. We also had a few hand me down Halo swaddles that didn't quite fit right so we didn't use them. Someone gave us a used “Ziggy Baby” one and we used it every night. It's definitely nice to have more than one of whatever works for you because they will barf on it overnight and get the neck all wet :)
Sleep sack: At about 12 weeks, River started busting out of the Ziggy Baby swaddle velcro and woke up with the whole thing bunched around his neck one morning, so we immediately ditched it. Now he sleeps in a Woolino sleep sack that a friend highly recommended to us. It fits them from 2 months to 2 years, which helps make the cost more palatable. Definitely a good registry item. It's heavy enough to kind of weigh him down in place but breathable enough that I don't worry about him overheating. So far we really like it. We're also lucky that we didn't have to do any kind of transitioning out of the swaddle, we just cold-turkey stopped and it only made him wake up maybe 1 extra time per night (2-3x instead of 1-2x) for a few nights before he adjusted.
BABY CARRIERS
Baby Bjorn carrier: a friend loaned us one. Easy to wear and comfortable. I like that it does a good job of keeping him straight upright. I'm not sure if this is the exact one because I think the one we're using is a bit older, but it looks most like this one.
Boba wrap: half the time, River screams when I try putting him in this. When he isn’t screaming, he slumps over fairly easily. I haven’t given up on it, but it’s not my top choice It’s hard to know when you’re wrapping it around yourself if you’re doing it right enough before the baby goes in, and then once they’re in it’s kind of hard/too late to tighten so you have to take them all the way out and readjust and then put them back in. If I used it regularly that might not be a problem. Once he has more core strength and can face outwards I think this might be better.
Baby K-tan: also got as a hand me down. I can’t figure this one out despite watching all the how to videos. River definitely hates this one the most. We’ve never successfully gotten into it.
Ergo Omni360: We just ordered this because it was on sale and are waiting for it to arrive. I am psyched about the ability to carry River on my back because when I wear him in the Baby Bjorn around the house to do stuff, I can't really bend forward without also having to support his head from flopping back, which means I can't do any forward-leaning things that require 2 hands (not something I had ever previously considered).
BATHROOM STUFF
Get a Squatty Potty if you don't already have one. Makes pooping more comfortable, decreases risk of hemorrhoids. Also useful for laboring at home, according to my doula.
I also highly recommend a bidet attachment for your toilet. We got one with a heated seat. It feels luxurious, you use less toilet paper, and also I would imagine that after a vaginal birth, it would take the place of using a peri bottle and the water is warm. So so so so so nice. Expensive, yes, but treat yo self.
OTHER BABY ACCESSORIES
Leachco pillow: nice thing to plop them on as a holding pen when they’re small. I think Boppy also makes a pillow like this.
Pack n play: we got this one because we thought we’d absolutely need the nappechanging attachment. We have used the attachment zero times. Also, babies puke a ton and there’s no removable cover for the pad so it gets kinda gross. We’re gonna use this as our crib once he’s out of the bassinet and then probably go straight to a bed. It is nice right now to have a second safe sleep location that can be in another room though so a pack n play in general is nice to have.
Bassinet: we’re using this one. It can attach to the bed so it’s more of a cosleeper, but then I’m not sure how I’d get out of bed, so we leave it unattached. Still like it even if we aren’t using the cosleep feature. It has wheels which is nice.
My last recommendation is that you take all the free stuff people want to give you. Even if you think you don’t need it or you already got one or you won’t use it, take it. I got two baby bouncers and it’s so nice to have one upstairs and one down even though at first I thought it was overkill. All 3 baby carriers I’ve tried were hand me downs and I’m glad we didn’t have to do a trial and error to find the one that works for us. You will go through 100,000 clothes so take them all (unless they have FUCKING SNAPS!!!!! AHHH!!!! (although actually, even then, take them. Just don't buy new clothes with snaps)) because it just allows you to go longer without doing laundry. I had two friends give me stuff (one had twins so it was kind of like getting extra haha), plus a woman at work. We were even walking around the block with River one day and someone was outside their house, saw us, and was like, “do you want baby clothes? I will leave them out on my porch for you,” and we took them and they are great. Take it all!!
BABY SKIN STUFF
River has dry, sensitive skin. I'm copy/pasting the advice and products our pediatric dermatologist sent to us (sorry, no links in this section, mama is tired). Basically, we don't use soap, and we slather him with Aquaphor baby ointment 2x/day. Here's the doctor's list:
GENTLE SKIN CARE RECOMMENDATIONS FOR BABIES
Bathing:

• Frequency is up to you. I'm okay with daily or every other day.
  
• Keep it short: 5-10 minutes.
  
• Temperature: medium warm.
  
• It's okay to use no soap.
  
• If dirty wash only dirty areas like the folds of the skin and the diaper area
  
• If you think soap is needed then use an unscented soap designed for eczema or sensitive skin like: CeraVe baby wash and shampoo
  

Aveeno baby cleansing therapy moisturizing wash
Cetaphil baby eczema calming wash
CeraVe Eczema Soothing Body Wash
Vanicream gentle body wash
Burt's Bees baby bee wash and shampoo (make sure it is the fragrance free one)

• Pat (don't rub) the skin dry with a soft towel.

Medicines:

• If using medicines apply them to active areas right after bathing onto damp skin.

Moisturizer:

• Thicker is better.
  
• Look for moisturizer that comes in a tube or a tub. If there is a pump on the bottle it is probably not thick enough
  
• Apply to the skin after medicines at least 2 times per day. More often is okay.
  
• Recommended products:
  

Vaseline (but avoid Baby Vaseline because it has fragrance)
CeraVe healing ointment
Aquaphor (baby or regular is okay)
Aveeno baby eczema therapy cream
Aveeno baby eczema therapy balm
Eucerin eczema relief body cream
Eucerin baby cream
Eucerin original healing cream
CeraVe cream
CeraVe heal and protect balm
Laundry:

• Use fragrance free, mild laundry detergents such as Arm and Hammer, All Free liquid, Kirkland fragrance free liquid, Cheer Free liquid, Seventh Generation, Dreft (check to be sure it says Fragrance Free)
  
• Avoid fabric softener or sheets in the dryer.
  

(This is long sorry, once I got going it helped to just let it all out.) TL;DR at the end.
My ex (F20) and I (M20) had a baby in February. As you can assume by our ages it wasn't planned, we'd used protection but well my daughter still came into this world. I love her, but the last 7 months have been hell thanks to the circumstances of the world and my ex. We had broken up about 2 weeks before she found out she was a month pregnant, and I immediately said I'd be there. I grew up without a father and I don't want the same for my child.
At first it was going fine-ish. I didn't think it was weird I missed the first few appointments, she said she already had them scheduled and I had work on those days and my boss wouldn't let me take them off. We were getting along well, talking about how we were going to do this, it was summer break from college and talking about how to manage it all. I had been working and going to college but living in dorms, and she was living at home going to college (college is in her home town not mine). I decided to get an apartment for myself so the baby could stay with me.
I'd told her when the baby was born she could stay over at my place for the first few months or so while we're getting our bearings and getting used to a newborn. Didn't think it was fair on her parents to have to have to deal with the nightly crying if we were getting along well enough to do it ourselves. So the plan was she'd move in at the 8 month mark, and my step-dad gave me two twin size beds from home that we set up in the bedroom. So basically we have twin bed, baby crib, twin bed. Like a dorm room with a baby setup.
We'd talk about names quite a bit, and what gender we wanted the baby to be. I'd said I'd like a boy since I would want to give him my step dad's name as his middle name (he's been really important in my life). She wanted a girl. and talked about how she liked "Celebrity baby names." I was pretty adamantly against those types of names, I didn't want my child to have a stupid name they'd have to change when they're an adult for people to take them seriously. Beyond that I was pretty open to names.
Well problems started when she kept making appointments when I had work or classes once they started back up. I took a half load of classes for semester one so I'd be able to pick up more shifts at work for the baby, and she kept telling me it was my fault I was working too much to be there. She told me we were having a boy one day after work, and I was upset she hadn't told me THAT appointment was today, I really wanted to be there. So I asked her point-blank if she didn't want me there at the appointments. She said she did want me to be there, I just work too much.
I started getting suspicious because she kept doing that, wouldn't show me any scans, and then her brother texted me that there'd been a guy at their house up in her room. Which, she can absolutely be doing that, we weren't together. But part of me started worrying that she was cutting me out because the conception date was after we broke up, and she wasn't as far along as she said. So I told her when our child was born I wanted a paternity test to make sure they were mine. And she flipped out on me. As in a 7 month pregnant woman started flipping furniture in my apartment calling me names because I didn't trust her.
For the next month and a half she treated me like shit, then demanded we do a prenatal. We did it, and found out the baby is mine. She then showed up at my apartment saying she's there for our arrangement. I said fine, because I didn't want to make problems. Around the 9 month I didn't take classes semester 2 so she'd be able to once the baby was here, and I had my phone on me constantly at work. Well one day I get home from work and she's not there. I tried calling her several times but nothing. So I literally went to the hospital, where I saw her mom before I even went to the desk. Her mom screamed at me for being so late, my daughter was already born and I failed the first part of being a father.
Well turns out EVERYONE but me knew she was having a girl (which isn't a problem, I just don't get the lie) and she called her mom to drive her to the hospital, texted like every family member and friend but didn't call me. By the time I got to see my daughter, she'd already been named and paperwork filled out and she put my name on the birth certificate. In the moment I didn't ask what her name was because I was overwhelmed with everything and realized her little bassinet or whatever said "Baby [My Last Name]. She constantly told me the baby would have her last name, which I wasn't the happiest about originally but we aren't married so I hadn't pushed it. So I was really happy about that and meeting my daughter that I guess I just didn't ask.
I found out her name on Facebook. I stayed with her in the hospital, they were watching over her for a few hours. During that time she was on facebook, and I checked a bit later and realized she'd posted pictures of us with the baby, and that her name was Blue Moon MyLastName (fake name but something equally weird for a child). I was beyond pissed, and asked her wth she was thinking, and she said she compromised and gave her my last name so she could have a better first/middle name. By then it was too late and my daughter has that name. I took them both home, and the first month went pretty good I'd say for newborn baby new parents. Then the world shut down in March and we decided it was best she stay until this is all over.
At some point she just assumed we were together. I wasn't seeing or talking to anyone else, and I thought about getting back together but we never discussed it or did anything romantic/sexual. Once again she posted on Facebook a picture of me with our daughter saying "future hubby with our baby girl." So I discussed with her about how we never talked about that, and maybe I'd be willing to give it another shot but there's things we have to work on first that ended our relationship the first time. She lost it at that, and took off with our 3 month old daughter for a few days during the middle of a pandemic. I freaked out and worried for days, until she finally came back. Came in with a guy following behind her, handed our crying daughter to me and took him to the bedroom. Well that night I slept on the couch off and on while holding my daughter. The guy left in the morning, and I basically asked wth this was all about. And she claimed since we're not together she can do what she wants. Which.. yes... but taking our 3 month old child away for several days during a pandemic, and come back with her screaming and bringing a stranger into the apartment?
Things haven't gotten much better. We're still living together because her parents are high risk, and she'll go between being all sweet, nice, a loving mom and wanting to be back together, to treating me like garbage and disappearing for days (not with our daughter) and coming back to tell me all about whatever guy she was with. She's not working, I'm able to work from home but beyond the occasional $100 from her parents I'm supporting the 3 of us. I'm just completely miserable, and I'm worried about how this is going to effect our daughter as she gets older. Her mother disappearing for days on end, and our sometimes getting along sometimes not. I refuse to actually fight with her about it since I don't want to yell in front of the baby, but she definitely yells.
I just don't know what to do anymore. Financially I'm barely supporting us, emotionally I'm drained because I actually for a little bit thought we could maybe work things out (I don't want to now). I haven't wanted to just kick her out since I know she'll take our daughter, and if she doesn't go home to her parents but goes with some other guy I don't know if she'll care for the baby or not, what kind of person these other guys are, if she's being exposed to the virus, if my ex will even let me see the baby without some long expensive custody battle. I've been just making this situation work the best I can for my daughter but I don't know how much longer I can do this. I'll keep doing it if it's the only way to make sure my daughter is safe, but it's straining me. Honestly if I could I'd just pack up my daughter and apartment and move back home with her and just let my ex come see her because she's putting so little effort in now and I don't feel like my daughter is safe going off alone with her. But I wouldn't do that because I do want my daughter to have her mother, I don't have money for a custody fight, and I don't want her to like claim out kidnapped our daughter or something. I know her parents will help her nail me to the wall if it comes to paying for court. I just don't know what to do anymore.
TL;DR My ex and I got stuck living together raising our baby because of corona, now she's sometimes nice to me and a good mother, the other half of the time she's gone, treating me like garbage, and ignoring our daughter. I feel stuck supporting the 3 of us in this because I feel like she'll take my daughter away if I kick her out.

I was maybe six when I remember seeing it for the first time. My grandmother knit it over the course of years. She was on her final sprint in life and was determined to leave something behind so resilient and beautiful that it could be passed down through the generations of our family–– an heirloom, an antique, a relic.
Her name was Constance but, as the only grandchild, I got to choose her nickname: Lubba. Apparently, it was my attempt at enunciating Lover, a common nickname she used on anyone she loved. I only remember all of this because it's been imprinted in my mind by trauma–– like ghostly apparitions seen only vaguely in the background of a still-life daguerreotype... there forever, but only faintly.
To weave a tapestry, I've since learned, takes very little practice. It's a common past-time even now for those looking to dabble in a hobby. But to create a photo-realistic landscape on par with the best paintings in the world? Now that takes years, even decades, of practice.
My Lubba, at the time she made the tapestry she would gift to me on my sixth birthday, was nearing seventy years of expertise in her craft. To say she was gifted would be an understatement. Her work was awe-inspiring.
She once had a showcase at a local art gallery and people came from all over the state of Alabama to see it. They had all sorts of flattering things to say. As intricate as a watchmaker is how an art historian put it. She could weave an exact replica of the Sistine Chapel, a fellow artist and friend of hers once said. But her favorite compliment was purportedly uttered beneath her granddaughter's breath: "jaw-breaking."
She just loved that. I guess I thought one look at her work made my jaw feel stretched and tired like when you gnaw on a jawbreaker for hours.
Anyway, I say all this to put you in my shoes as a six-year-old girl given a present I truly adored by the one person in the world I truly loved more than any other–– even my own parents.
I remember opening it and unfurling this great mass of woven thread until I could lay it across the living room carpet, stretching it over the coffee table and over the arms of both our couches. There were so many colors, greens and blues and purples all cascading like a rainbow behind a waterfall–– all blending and blurring until I could make out the entire picture... a forest.
Not just a forest, of course, but that was the main attraction. There was also a river and some rocks and mountains in the distance, all below a sun-setting sky that burned orange and bloody. I remember it made me want my favorite popsicle, the Cotton Candy swirl.
My parents helped me pin the tapestry to the wall in my bedroom and we pushed my little twin bed up against it so that I could feel like I was sleeping in a peaceful forest.
Lubba didn't let on but I could tell she was genuinely proud, even satisfied, that I had chosen to display her work so prominently. I attribute that deep level of satisfaction to being the reason we received the news we did the next morning: Lubba had passed away in her sleep.
I thought then, and I still do now, that her soul felt at peace knowing her memory would live within that tapestry–– that she would never be forgotten so long as her art was passed down within our family.
But I think maybe I underestimated the power that memories can have. I think maybe what happened next was somehow connected to the pain and anguish that losing a loved one can cause.
I don't think I'll ever fully understand it–– in the same way our minds can't comprehend the after-life or how it continues to affect those who still live. It's my belief that ghosts are physical manifestations of pain that still haunt the minds and hearts of those who have lost someone.
And it's my belief that whatever lives in that tapestry is something similar... something connected to the pain that resulted from my Lubba's death.
All I remember of the second night with the tapestry is that I was sad, and when I looked at my Lubba's art on my wall, it made me feel at once peaceful yet heartbroken.
I remember falling asleep with tears in my eyes, my perspective distorted and shimmering and, the last thing I remember seeing was a canoe upon the river at the bottom of the tapestry that hadn't been there before.
And then it started moving, flowing down the waters and...
Then I was asleep. I knew it because I was in the canoe on the river.
I was inside the tapestry.
The forest loomed large and shadows danced upon the shores before me. I could barely see the peaks of the mountains behind the trees as the sun sunk below them, a darkness sweeping across the land like a windswept phantom.
I was scared.
The canoe skirted against the riverbank and I climbed out, my bare feet upon dirt that felt so real I began to physically shake with fear.
Was I really there? How? Would I ever see home again?
And then I saw a barely-perceptible fire deep within the woods, I was drawn to it like an insect, my mind overcome with curiosity but, as I took my first steps into the forest, my feet kicked a branch, making a noise that reverberated off the trunks of ancient bark all around me until...
I heard it... the deep, guttural pronouncement of a beast.
Something otherworldly.
Something that made me instinctively scramble back to the canoe.
I began paddling with just my arms and hands until, over the water, the shadow of whatever-it-was swept over me, its silhouette backed by distant moonlight.
As I turned to see it for the first time, I awakened.
I was in my bed but I was covered by the tapestry. I clawed and kicked until I could see my room where the first thing I noticed was a dark, wet substance lining the walls and floor.
The air smelled of fury and fire.
I screamed when I saw him... my father... dead, in a pool of blood and still gasping for air, his last snapshot view of this world his own daughter screaming with terror.
Then my mother came, scrambling into the room, slipping upon her own husband's viscous, draining lifeblood.
She looked to me, then to him, and I could see the glimmer of thought–– of wonder–– of terror–– of desperation to clear the thought from her mind just as quickly as it entered.
The next thing I remember is my father's body placed inside a black, zip-up bag, wheeled away by pale-stricken paramedics and my mother escorted to the back of a police car, her bloodstreaked arms restrained by handcuffs.
I didn't see that tapestry again for twenty-four years.
Not until my husband found it buried deep within a box of other family heirlooms.
Not until he unfurled it and was taken aback by the sheer elegance of the woven, jaw-breaking art.
Not until he tacked it to the wall behind our first and only child's crib.
And then a new terror began.
–––
We had our son when we were both thirty. We met during RAP week–– the Ranger Assessment Phase of Ranger School. Many couples say they've been through hell and back together, but Zaire and I meant it. I knew going in that nearly sixty percent of all flame-outs come in the first four days of Ranger School, yet I swear to the Good Lord that I was hell-bent on quitting on that fourth day.
It was Zaire that convinced me not to.
Those days are all about weeding out the weak–– separating the wheat from the chaff. It's all mind games. To be a Ranger, first and foremost, you must be strong mentally.
Physicality can be taught and, to some degree, so can the psychology of a warrior but, at the foundation-level of the human soul, we are all built from a template. Some are made for running into fire, and others from it.
I didn't know which one I was until I met Zaire.
It was him who introduced me to myself, for the first time.
I remember I crawled out of the brutal ocean waves on that fourth day, covered in salt water and sand, determined to get myself the fuck out of there and then a hand helped me to my feet.
Through my delirium I could see him, Zaire, holding my cheeks in his palms and peeling my eyelids open and yelling something over and over to me.
After I shook off the fog, I could hear him: "Doban, you are a warrior–– you hear me? Doban? Jo? Doban, you are a fucking warrior!"
And then I saw his eyes and my own reflection in them.
I saw what he saw.
This battle-broken woman standing on a beach among dozens of men, some still on their backs on the shore of the Atlantic, some ringing the bell not twenty yards behind me.
It was at that moment that I realized who I really was, what I was made for.
Two years later, we were married. Multiple tours in the Middle East kept us apart for most of our marriage, but five years after our vows and seven after the year we met, I was pregnant for the first time.
We both took leave and made sure to create a happy home for our little boy.
By the time we came back from the hospital, we had the nursery in tip-top shape. Zaire even built a crib from scratch. He was great with his hands–– trust me.
Only a couple months into being parents, Zaire was close to being re-deployed. He had just one more week with us before he was gone for three months.
I remember I had a check-up with my OBGYN and I was crossing my fingers that they would clear me for greater physical activity. I was missing my early morning jogs but, most of all, I was missing my husband... that feeling of your soul merging with another in a moment of existential ecstasy.
I've never tried drugs in my entire life, but I can't imagine anything doing to the human mind what the physical act of love can do.
I returned from my check-up with great news. Bought some candles on my way home, some wine, and I burst inside our house with a smile I couldn't hide. I found them in the nursery and what I saw when I stepped inside sent a chill down my spine so strong that I dropped the entire bottle of blended red onto our brand-new light gray rug.
Our son, Kodiak, was lying on his back in his hand-made crib while Zaire stood on a little stool with his back to me, hammering fabric against the far wall.
It was the tapestry–– my grandmother's–– my Lubba's.
Faded into the bottom right corner was the faint hint of red–– someone's attempt at washing my father's bloodstain–– as if his body were still spilling into the woven river.
Zaire turned when he heard the glass shatter, helping me step around the broken shards and he followed my frozen gaze to the tapestry–– to that fabric forest.
He wanted to know what was wrong.
Naturally, I lied. I said I was just suddenly feeling nauseous. Probably just been on my feet for too long. To protect my secret, I sacrificed our good news.
To shield myself from embarrassment, I prolonged our period of no sexual contact.
I regret that now.
The story of what happened to my parents was always a sore subject. Back in high school, my classmates knew me as the sad girl. Someone found out why and rumors spread like fire. Her mom killed her dad, someone whispered. Her mom's a murderer, someone else blurted out. She comes from crazy, a popular girl sneered. I won't deny that I took advantage of that new image. If they wanted crazy, I would give them crazy.
Beginning of the next week, I just stared at one of the popular girls until she lost her shit. I stabbed a mean boy with a tack randomly when I passed him in the hallway until he finally realized who the culprit was and nearly choked me unconscious. I even stood my ground with the school bully at the end of school one week–– I kicked her so many times in the ribs that she shit herself through her white jeans. My godparents were so disappointed they sent me to boarding school until I aged-out.
I think maybe that's what led me to the Army. I had a lot of anger. I wanted someone to pay for my own pain. And it really helped. I got a lot of anger out of my system–– and I mean a lot.
Then I learned about Ranger School. I loved the idea of it. Probably because I felt lost or because I felt I had lost the people I loved most.
To me, it sounded like a place you go to learn how to either find your ghosts or become one.
By the time I had met Zaire, I was a very different person than the one who spent those eighteen years full of pain and anger. I knew how to express my hostility in a healthy way and how to shield people from my own internal issues.
In short, I knew how to hide things.
So when he wanted to know why my parents, or any family for that matter, were not coming to our wedding, it was a really simple matter of weaving lies together to form a believable truth.
I told him they gave me up for adoption when I was born and I hated my adoptive parents. I had no family and I was okay with it. Which, to be completely transparent, wasn't a lie.
Victor Frankl says human beings can endure any how if they have a worthy why, or something like that.
When I met Zaire, I knew I had found my why.
And having Kody just strengthened it.
I couldn't really remember having a reason to live for before. If you need proof of that, just take a gander at the cuts on my inner thighs.
My whole life was a cry for help until him–– until them.
And that's why seeing that tapestry on my son's wall, looming over the very place he sleeps at night, made me fear for something for the first time in a long time.
But I couldn't tell Zaire the whole truth.
I just swallowed it, I stomached it and held it down, just like I'd learned in my teens. Keep down your dinner until you're alone, until you excuse yourself and crank the shower to cover the sounds of hacking–– of vomit splashing.
I was well-practiced at hiding things, so that's what I did.
I pretended it was all okay. And to some degree, I believed that.
I was only six when I saw my dad die, when I saw my mom taken away and blamed for it. Even though I knew in my bones that she would never hurt him, it was impossible to voice what I truly believed. How do you tell someone that there's a monster living inside the tapestry on your wall?
Just thinking it sounds ridiculous.
I only went to her trial for one day. For my own sworn testimony. They coached me beforehand. Listened to my tall-tale about a monster I saw in my dream and how I had fallen asleep and awakened inside the forest in my tapestry.
They convinced me that it was all a dream.
They told me what really happened.
They rewired my thoughts, re-weaved my own memories.
I came to believe what they believed: that she killed him.
It made sense too. A woman distraught about the death of her own mother loses sanity temporarily and becomes a quick-trigger, overreacting with extreme emotion.
So I listened to their story and I started to see it. I didn't know anything then about eyewitness suggestibility–– the idea that you can hear what someone else believes you saw and actually see it as if that's what really happened.
I listened to them. I saw it. I believed it. So I said it.
And that's why my mother is still in a psychiatric facility to this day.
If only I had spoken with her, even once, in all those years since her sentencing, maybe all of this wouldn't have happened... or at least not to me.
When I knelt to help Zaire pluck the broken pieces of the wine bottle out of the carpet in Kody's nursery, I remember doing it slowly. I needed time to think of an excuse.
And after I made it up, I just returned to our bedroom and shut the door. I laid atop our sheets, staring at the ceiling, and I guess I fell asleep.
Because what happened next happened deep into the night.
I awakened to the sound of a baby crying. Not an uncommon occurrence, mind you. It took me a good minute or so just to rise enough to put my feet on the ground.
My body hurt. My mind felt hazy. I looked to my bedside table and remembered: oh yeah, the pills. I had been taking them since Kody was born. No one tells you about the insomnia when they prep you for motherhood. That, or the depression.
By the time I found my legs and I'd opened the bedroom door, he'd already stopped crying. Sometimes he does that. Wakes crying from a dream before sleep washes over his again–– like a temporary panic-breath between crashing ocean waves.
I'd be lying if I said I wasn't jealous of that. The involuntary nature of a baby's sleep. What I would give for that.
Already awake now, I returned to the beside and grabbed an empty glass of water and checked our little baby-monitor webcam to find Zaire rocking Kody.
What a great dad, I thought. They looked so cute I even took a screenshot, a really convenient little tool the gizmo let you do. I'd already taken hundreds that saved directly to my photos in the Cloud that I would scroll through for hours.
I walked to our master bath and poured some water from the tap and guzzled it. Those pills really dehydrate you. I wondered about whether I should stop using them before I returned to bed and I just sat there watching my husband rock my son on the little monitor before I saw something that made my mind feel like a kaleidoscope–– like I was conscious for something I shouldn't have been–– a reordering of my brain matter–– a recycling of my synapses–– like I was a flesh-covered rubix cube with a master that had finally found the right combination of moves to make me right again.
I swear on my life and the life of my son that this is true:
Zaire was rocking Kody in a little recliner beside the crib, his back to the tapestry that flowed with the current of an oscillating fan. His stubbled chin was against his son's soft scalp when the flesh of a pale arm extended from the woven threads behind the chair and a long, decrepit fingernail neared his throat.
Even when the fingernail pierced his neck and punctured his carotid artery, I was frozen in shock and disbelief and abject horror.
It wasn't the blood that woke the baby. It was the force of the creature heaving the chair against an adjacent wall and shattering a window that brought about his fear-filled wails.
I felt the whole house shake at that moment and I guess that's what jostled me out of my state of existential awe. I stumbled for the bedroom door and scrambled down the hallway and threw open the nursery door and I just stood there before I fell to my knees.
Someone told me later that they heard a woman scream as loud as a fighter jet hitting a sonic boom.
But I don't remember that.
All I remember is that Zaire was on the ground, his bulbous neck veins nearly emptied of their contents, staining the already-wine-stained carpet, and then I looked to the broken window and the toppled-over chair and I realized that Kody was missing. I turned as the fan oscillated, billowing the tapestry in a way that made the the fabric river appear as if it were really flowing. And there, upon the woven waters was a little canoe that wasn't there before, just like I'd seen so many years ago in my youth and, as I crawled closer to the impeccably-woven threads, I could barely make out the outline of a little baby in a basket within the wooden vessel.
And a face. In the canoe with Kody.
Someone I recognized. Someone I had known and loved.
They had one hand upon the wicker basket that held my child and the other on an oar that controlled the canoe.
Dressed in a black robe with long, flowing gray hair.
Like a boatman for the River Styx.
The face was unforgettable.
Seared into my memory like a blood-brand.
My Lubba
–––
Part Two: Coming Soon

So this is an update on the Greta situation. You can find the first part of this here. I really gotta thank you guys that pushed me to go through with this. Last night was an amazing time! Freaky as hell, but also cool as hell. I have a good couple of hours before work to get this all down so hopefully I can do that before I go in. And sorry if any of this is poorly written or rushed, it’s cause I have a lot to say and it is rushed lol. I wanna update you guys as quick as possible and don’t wanna wait until after shift.
Anyway onto the good shit. I texted Greta back and forth before the trip, trying to get details. She wanted to keep it a secret until we actually went, but I think she could tell I was still nervous so she spilled the beans early. Let me start off by saying I’ve lived in a rural area in Wisconsin for about 4 years now. I knew there was a bunch of farmland around, but I never knew just how much until driving around a lot last year with my girlfriend at the time. I live right on the border to Illinois and not even an hour away from both Chicago and Milwaukee, so I always figured it was more of an urban area. The downtown part of my city suggests that too, but wow there really is a lot more fields and forests around than I thought.
Greta says she knows this abandoned farmhouse a little ways out. That’s not that uncommon. There was this old ass barn in the middle of a field right outside of my work that’d been sitting there for so long that one day it collapsed in on itself. I figure this could be a similar deal. I’d always wanted to scope out that barn before they finally cleared it out and I’m still kicking myself for missing out on the chance, but this was my shot to do something similar!
She said that she hadn’t been there in a few years, but the place is haunted by a poltergeist. Like things being thrown around, doors opening and slamming out of nowhere, stuff like that. She said it’s one of those places that’s filled with belongings of the family that lived there like they suddenly left one day abandoning everything. She looked through the place thoroughly before but didn’t wanna say much about it so I could explore it myself.
She told me that she was sure the entity itself wasn’t harmful. That it fed off of attention and fear, but it wasn’t the kind of thing that could follow us outside of the house. She said it isn’t very strong. I’m gonna be honest, even with what happened in July, I was still kind of skeptical. Like when she talks about stuff like that it still feels almost… I’m not trying to sound mean but it sounds dumb. But she’s always so sure of herself and I’m way more open minded since I’ve seen that door in the woods. And now after last night, the things she says are sounding less and less weird to me.
Yesterday she came and picked me up at around 4pm so we still had a lot of daytime and a chance to grab dinner and snacks for later. We didn’t wanna go too early cause yeah it’s spooky, but there really is only so much to do in an abandoned house and we didn’t want to spend both all day and night there. The ride was almost an hour so I spent it interrogating her about things. Now I wanted to know more about her and what she did. I’ve always ignored her whenever she’d bring up the supernatural, and now I wish I paid more attention or encouraged her to talk more.
I asked her things like what’s the craziest or scariest thing she’d seen? But she said she didn’t want to scare me off this early. She’d tell me more after this trip and let me decide if I wanted to go any further with this. I figured that was fair, so I asked how long she’s been doing this. She told me she’s always stumbled on weird shit due to her abnormally strong 6th sense ever since she was incredibly small. She said the earliest thing she could remember was being around 4 or 5 and staying at a hotel in Virginia for some reason. She and her parents stayed there for a weekend, and she’d talk to the spirit of a nice old man at night. Looking back, she’s not sure if it really was a ghost, because most spirits aren’t actually human, but she liked to think it was just a kind old man and nothing more.
But she never started actively seeking paranormal activity until she was around 13. Her parents divorced around that time. Her dad moved to Colorado and she had a lot of tension with her mom. She has always been aware of different energies, but until then she was always afraid to follow them. She was so lost during that time and figured maybe she could find purpose among the stranger parts of the world. In a way she did, and she’s been following her senses ever since. She’s been studying mythologies and reading other people’s experiences trying to find explanations for some of the shit she’s seen and felt. She thinks that there's a lot of truth in many cultures, but none have the full picture and many have different perspectives on the same things. Like how so many cultures have so many different versions of what we’d call a vampire.
I jokingly asked her if vampires were real and she gave me the most serious look. She wouldn’t elaborate further. She’s been really secretive about the specifics, still worried that I’d wanna back out before this first night. I figured my questions should probably stray from the dangers of all this for now and decided to focus on something else.
Somebody on my last post suggested I ask her about my aura since Greta could read energies, so I did just that and questioned her if anything about mine drew her to me. She told me one of the nicest things I’ve ever heard from somebody and I think it’s the kind of thing that’ll stick with me forever. She said that the night we met was a hard one for her, and I radiated with so much warmth and healing energy that just standing by me helped calm her. That’s why she’s been so adamant about wanting me to tag along with her and why she was being so paranoid about me wanting to back out. She’s been doing this kind of thing alone for a long time, and she doesn’t want to lose the opportunity of having somebody like me by her side for it.
When she told me that, any idea of backing down, even after our trip, was dashed away. I was in it no matter how this went. And thankfully, it went well anyway.
We spent the rest of the drive talking about more mundane and personal stuff, nothing that’d be as interesting to you guys as the psychic and spooky shit, but it was a very pleasant drive.
It was getting close to 6 by the time we got there so we had 2ish hours of daylight to kill. The road we took was nearly barren almost the entire trip, only like two other cars passed by us and all I fuckin saw were fields the whole time. Greta turned down a small gravel road that cut through the fields and we ended up at the farmhouse. It was nearly exactly what I pictured in my head. A decently sized two story abode, with a fenced off area in front of it where animals would’ve roamed and a barn nearby. The place didn’t even look all that run down. Definitely not like the barn that was outside my work. I almost thought we pulled into somebody’s house if it weren’t for the lack of animals, part of the fence being missing, no lights being on, and two of the windows being busted out.
Once we were actually there, I felt a pit in my gut grow. I was fine on the ride, more excited than anything. But seeing the building itself, knowing something was inside and seeing just how far in the middle of nowhere we were grounded me for a moment. I checked my phone and realized I had absolutely zero signal either. Greta must’ve noticed me freeze up, because I felt her hand on my shoulder and she promised if it was too much, we could sleep in the car. I pointed out how small her car was and just just said we’d make it work.
We grabbed the stuff we brought for the night out of the back seat and went to step inside. I don’t wanna say I got cold feet or anything, because I wasn’t gonna back down from this, but I did stop on the porch as she swung the door open and stepped inside. I just stared at the entrance, my heart racing. It seemed so dark and gloomy inside, but Greta’s face peeked back out, brightening the view.
She wanted to know if I was okay, and I thought about one of the comments I got in my last post, suggesting I bring stuff like salt and holy water. Things that’d protect us from spirits and the like. I asked if she’d brought anything like that, and she said her trunk is filled with all sorts of protective materials along with survival supplies, but she didn’t think we’d be needing it. She said we could bring some of it in if it made me feel better, but I shook my head. I trusted her now. If she says it’s safe, I believe her. I knew I was just fretting and anxious. But it does make me more comfortable about taking these trips with her knowing she has gear for it.
The inside of this place was wild. It was like a time capsule. The furniture and decorations around made me think of my great grandma’s house. I expected there to be signs of squatting or urban exploration. I thought it’d be a mess in there. But it wasn’t that bad. It was dusty and moldy, sure, like you could see the dust floating in the air when we turned on our flashlights later, and I could spot patches of black mold in some of the corners. I’m sure breathing the air in there was horrible for us, but for the most part, it was pretty tidy.
The front door led straight into the living room, which was attached right to the kitchen. The only thing that separated the two was a counter, which was filled with old appliances, untouched for years. There was even a line of bowls and a pot of something. I couldn’t tell really what it once was, but the inside practically had its own ecosystem. In the living room, there was a tiny ass TV with antennas that made it look like it was ripped out of the 70s. Though it was knocked screen first on the floor and looked broken. The walls were lined with art and photographs. I paid particular attention to the photos. They were all small, with faded color. So I knew the place wasn’t “black and white” old. But the pictures were clearly from a different era. From them I got an idea of who used to live here. It was a family of four, a mom, a dad and two daughters. The latest I could find, the eldest daughter looked like she was in her late teens while the younger one looked maybe 11 or 12. The parents looked like they had an age gap too, the man looked to be maybe in his 50s while the woman looked mid 30s at most. But they were farmers too, and I know working outside all day wasn’t the best on the skin, so maybe the guy looked older than he was.
We set all our stuff in the living room and Greta encouraged me to explore. She promised she’d be right next to me the whole time. So I did. The back of the living room led to a hallway that split to a set of stairs. I followed the hallway first, seeing it led to three rooms. One was a bathroom that didn’t have much special going on. One was a bedroom with a queen sized bed and looked to belong to the parents. And the last was actually a baby’s room complete with a crib and toys scattered around. That struck me as odd because I didn’t see any pictures with the whole family and a baby.
I scoped out the baby room first because it seemed the most interesting to me. It looked like a little boys room mainly because there were wooden cars lined up across the floor and a tipped over box of wooden building blocks. I’d think a girls room back in the day would be filled with more dolls and pink. There were a few stuffed animals around though that looked kinda moldy. There was a shelf attached to the wall by the crib that was decorated with models and a dinosaur, but what unsettled me was this toy clown that sat on the end. It was so faded, you could barely make out the painted on grin, and that made it even more creepy.
The freakiest detail about the house was that there was a baby doll in the crib. My heart skipped a beat when I first saw it because I thought it was an actual baby for a second. Greta said it was weird cause it wasn’t there last time she was here. When she saw my reaction she laughed and said she was just fucking with me. It’s been there since she found this place. It was still creepy af though.
The parents’ room was much less interesting, aside from a few small items that gave me a little insight to the people that used to live here. What made the room worth mentioning though was a picture that was knocked off the wall and the frame that held it into place was shattered. I picked it up, seeing it was a family picture with the mother, father, and two daughters again. Still missing a baby boy. The picture was halfway out of the frame so I could see part of the back. When I flipped it over, I saw the family’s last name along with the date December 31st 1978. I won’t say the family’s name just cause I think at least the daughters would probably still be around and I’ll be name dropping first names later.
The second thing was the biggest discovery of the whole house. A box under the bed that was filled with dozens of envelopes all to and from the same place. An address in Illinois. Greta was grinning when I found it. Obviously she’d known about it, and she was waiting for me to discover it. We talked for a minute and agreed that once I was done looking through the place, we’d sit outside in the remaining daylight and read the letters.
Next was the upstairs, which only had two rooms. The stairs on the way up felt unstable as hell and some of them creaked so loud I thought they’d break under my weight. It made me really uneasy but we still went upstairs. There was another hallway that split into only two rooms, which must’ve been the two daughter’s rooms. One was painted a dull pink and filled to the brim with dolls and scattered clothes. The dolls freaked me out and I didn’t spend too much time there. I swear one of them moved ever so slightly when I tried to look away from it, but I couldn’t tell if it was just my paranoia. The second daughter’s room was slightly more spartan. The wallpaper was this loud ass pink flowery deal and there were faded posters of stuff I couldn’t recognize. Except for one. There was a Pink Floyd poster that I thought was pretty cool. There was a desk with a mirror and a dusty old record player with a record still in it and a nightstand next to the bed with an old radio. I joked that if either of those randomly turned on and started playing some creepy shit I’m going home.
The whole time I was searching the house, I felt almost bad. Like I was trespassing and invading someone's privacy. I think because the house was so well preserved, it really felt like I was just rummaging through somebody’s things even though nobody had lived there for decades.
I also felt like I was being watched. Like I was being intensely judged. I thought I could see things in the corner of my vision. Not shapes as much as movement, but again it could’ve just been paranoia. I kept hearing light footsteps outside whichever room I happened to be in too. Like somebody was pacing just outside in the hallway. I asked Greta if she noticed it too and she said yeah, but it wasn’t anything to worry about. It was just curious about us. That phrasing really didn’t help me feel less afraid.
We were walking out with the box of envelopes when I noticed an opened one and an unfolded piece of paper set on the kitchen table. Greta grabbed it for me and we went out on the porch.
It was getting to be late evening at this point, the sky was lit up bright red and I’d hoped we’d have enough time to read the letters before it got dark. Especially once I saw how faded the writing had become over the years.
I started by reading the opened one on the counter and it gave me a taste of what to expect. I don’t remember what it said exactly, but it was addressed to somebody named Becky from a woman named Sarah. As I read through the letters I figured out Becky was the mother in all the pictures and Sarah was her sister.
The opened note was from Sarah to Becky, and was consoling her saying that if Tom became too much, she and the kids would be able to stay at her place for a while. My guess of what happened is that Becky saw the note and took Sarah up on that offer, never coming back.
The rest of the letters painted a better picture for me. Most were mundane and were just average letters between sisters. And seemed pretty spaced out time wise. They mentioned calls they’d make with each other so I knew they talked on the phone along with the letters, so I think there’s details I’m missing because of that. Greta hinted to where in the letters to start looking.
This is our theory on what happened between the details we could gather from the old, worn writing. I’m not sure if this is even that accurate, but Greta and I discussed and theorized a lot and this is what I think happened. Tom and Becky were a couple that’d been together for around 23 years and had two daughters, Janice and Sandra. Sometime in 79 Tom had gotten terminally ill and was bed ridden for the better part of a year. Becky vented to Sarah in the letters, talking about how difficult it was to deal with both him and the kids.
I dunno when exactly or how she met him, but Becky ended up involved with another man named Richard. She seemed pretty conflicted about it and Sarah seemed to support the idea of Richard, claiming that Becky was “just preparing for the reality of Tom’s death,” which to me sounds shitty as hell.
I think the eldest daughter, Janice, started getting suspicious of her mother, but wasn’t giving Becky much hassle yet. There seemed to be some tension though from what Becky said. Right before Tom finally kicked the bucket, Becky ended up pregnant with Richard’s kid, which turns out was gonna be a boy. Tom died around the time she started showing signs, thankfully he never realized what was going on. Janice noticed though, and her mother’s pregnancy proved Becky’s affair to her, and Janice flew off the handlebars. Causing a lot of stress to Becky before finally running away.
Again, I’m not sure the circumstances or what the hell changed, but suddenly in the letters Janice was back, but was still furious at her mom. The entire time Sandra, the younger sister, still wasn’t sure what was going on but was very distressed by the death of her father and sudden conflict in her family.
All the while there’s this growing thing in the background. It starts off by mentioning weird things here and there going on around the house and is hardly mentioned in the earlier letters. But by the end, the incidents were almost the entirety of the messages. Like hardcore poltergeist shenanigans and vivid, fucked up nightmares.
It was really sad because the whole time, Becky talks about how the biggest light in her life is the hope of this child she had on the way. The thought of her son is the only thing really holding her together. Through several of the letters, she talks about how she was buying toys and decorating his room and it sounded like a therapeutic experience for her. I have no idea what happened to Richard, he’s not even mentioned past the point where Janice came back, which makes me think even more that there’s a huge chunk of story we’re missing there.
There’s this growing sense of despair and paranoia through the entire read that finally explodes with the worst news ever. Becky had a miscarriage. It was honestly hard to tell what happened at first. I think Becky dropped the news to Sarah either in a call or in person, because she never straight up says it in the messages. All the letters from this point really go off the deep end, becoming the ramblings of a deeply distraught mother.
She became convinced that whatever was haunting her was actually Tom and he killed her baby out of revenge for the affair. Dude, those final few letters really broke my heart. They were so hard to read. I’m not sure what was going on with the daughters because they’re never brought up after that point either.
That’s where the letters ended off and I still feel so much like I’m left hanging. I really want to know what happened to that broken family. I’m pretty sure they ended up moving in with Sarah and left everything of their old life behind. But did they find peace after that? I know this all happened decades ago, but man I want closure. I know the family’s name so maybe I’ll look them up later. Hopefully I can get something, but that’ll have to wait until after shift.
By the time we were done, it was dark, and thankfully the flashlights were sufficient enough to finish off our reading. We went back inside and spent a good amount of the night theorizing and trying to piece everything together. Of course, Greta had already read the letters a long time ago and had her own ideas of what happened, but she really wanted to hear what I thought of it. My interpretation of it was nearly spot on with her initial thoughts and we talked about it more, growing our own theory on it.
One thing we’re not positive of is the identity of the entity that haunts the place. Greta isn’t completely convinced that it’s Tom like Becky thought. She says she thinks it’s something that was drawn by all the negativity that festered in the place during that time. But at the same time, whatever it is is tied to this house, which only happens if a spirit was attached to something there. It doesn’t even need to be something physical like an object, but to memories. So it could also be Tom or else it would’ve left by now. But there could be so much negative emotion still lingering after decades for it to feed on. The fact that the place is like a shrine or a reminder to that family and all the trauma they’d gone through could suggest that.
The entity itself though, I could tell was pissed that we were talking about all this. The thing went into haunting overdrive. The entire time the house was alive with sounds and crashes, and it made it really hard to focus on our conversation. Anytime something would happen though, Greta told me to ignore it and that it can’t actually hurt us.
There were loud stomps that came from upstairs, like somebody was sprinting up and down the hallway up there. Doors to other rooms opened and slammed. We heard a loud ass crash in the kitchen that we went to check out and we found a single fucking boot sitting dead center of the floor. It definitely wasn’t there before and we never found its twin. At one point the stomping sound came from the downstairs hallway right towards the living room where we were staying and I thought for sure something would come rushing in, but it stopped just outside the doorway.
I forgot to mention there was a door that led to a basement in the kitchen, which I refused to go down the entire time. And there kept being a knocking that came from it. We both had to pee a few times through the night and I really didn’t want to be left alone so we would always come with each other. We used the bathroom there even though it didn’t have running water. We just didn’t look when we went and I think Greta just hovered over the toilet when she went cause there’s no way she was letting her ass touch that seat. One of the times we were in there though, the door slammed shut and scared the shit outta me and even made Greta jump.
While we chilled in the living room, I kept looking into the hallway behind us, cause I thought I could maaaybe see a figure peeking out of the darkness watching us, but you know when it’s so dark things are like staticy? That might’ve been a mixture of me seeing shapes in the static and my own panicking brain trying to see things. So I’m not as sure about that one.
She’d brought a laptop with some movies downloaded for us to watch, but not even 20 minutes into Ratatouille, it died. We had no way to charge it and Greta was annoyed. Mostly at herself because she says spirits drain electronics and she didn’t know why she didn’t expect that to happen.
While we were watching that, I felt something breathing on my neck and was too scared to look behind me, so I told her and looked back and told me it was okay, there was nothing there. I know I’ve been really emphasizing how utterly terrified I’ve been with everything, but honestly Greta really has a way with calming me down. She makes me feel protected and cared for, and she seems so knowledgeable and sure of herself that I can’t help but trust her.
When we actually went to bed, she kept close. Her sleeping bag was pressed against mine, letting me know she was there. Between all the sounds and crashes, I didn’t think there’d be any hope of getting any sleep, but I think she felt me shaking and she put her arm around me and suddenly everything felt okay. Like she could handle whatever was there with us and if she says I was safe, then I was safe.
I did fall asleep, and I expected to have nightmares, but instead I had no dreams. Which in itself is really weird because I have vivid, long dreams every single night. But not last night. Not that I’m complaining. I’d rather have nothing instead of ghost fueled nightmares.
We did get woken up very early by the sound of the bowls on the counter crashing against the kitchen floor and shattering. My phone was dead, but Greta’s was barely holding on thanks to a mobile charger that was also almost drained, and she saw it was almost 5am. We decided to wrap it up and leave at that point. We were both groggy and more grumpy than scared at that point. Greta mentioned that something similar happened one time she was here, and the broken TV woke her up by nearly falling on her head. She put everything we moved back where we found it, including the letters and the one on the table, saying it was bad luck to disturb haunted ground unless you put everything back where it was meant to be. Which is a bummer because I wanted to keep the letters and maybe the record player, but she was very very adamant that you absolutely do not take anything from a haunted place. That’s inviting something to follow you home, and even though this thing isn’t strong enough to follow us on it’s own, it could still attach itself to something we remove from its space.
Leaving that horrible place was a massive relief. The joy of being on the road again and seeing that house in the rear-view almost overshadowed my exhaustion, but I gotta admit that I relished the experience. It was heartbreaking and absolutely terrifying, but I’m glad I did it. I’m happy I got to experience it with Greta. She confessed on the ride back that the reason she chose that place as our first adventure together was because, unlike a lot of places, there’s evidence of a story there. There were pieces of a mystery we could put together, and she knew it was pretty safe for the two of us.
She asked me what I thought and I told her what I said in that last paragraph. She asked if I wanted to do more with her and I told her that I had already decided I would before we even arrived at that house. She was so overjoyed, gushing about how there’s so many places she wants me to see and how excited she was to have somebody join her. It put a smile on my face seeing her so happy. I’m glad I could do that for her.
I got home a little after 6 and I’ve been typing ever since. I’m cutting it super close to when I have to go to work actually, but I really wanted to share this while it’s still so fresh on my mind. Not only just for anybody reading this, but for myself as well. I wanna keep this written down so I can always remember how this was and how I feel. I haven’t even had a chance to shower, which actually kinda sucks cause I know I need to after spending the night in a place like that, but I’m too tired and excited to really care. Again, I’m sorry if any of this has sounded off, I spent the past what like 6...ish hours non stop typing after barely sleeping last night lol. Thanks to anyone that made it this far. I hope you found my experience as enjoyable as I have <3

Welcome to my Secret History of House Martell series: a revised, expanded iteration of my nutty ideas regarding all things Nymeros-Martell.
This post is Chapter 2 in said series. You can also read this on my blog, here: https://asongoficeandtootles.wordpress.com/2019/02/19/the-secret-history-of-house-martell-chapter-2/.
This post assumes familiarity with Chapter 1, although it doesn't entirely rely on it. In Chapter 1 (which you can read in 3 parts on reddit, BEGINNING HERE, or in one giant post on my blog HERE), I argued for the following propositions:

• Quiet Isle's Elder Brother is now in the Vale in the guise of Ser Morgarth the Merry, a hedge knight hired by (an unwitting) Littlefinger. He is likely seeking Sansa Stark in concert with "Ser Shadrich" and "Ser Byron the Beautiful". (I have elsewhere argued that Ser Shadrich is Howland Reed and that Ser Byron is Sandor Clegane glamored to look like the AWOL Tyrek Lannister—who is himself Quiet Isle's gravedigger.)
  
• The man known as both Elder Brother and Ser Morgarth is in fact Prince Lewyn Martell of Dorne, who is "dead" in the same sense Sandor Clegane is now "dead".
  
• Elder BrotheSer Morgarth the Merry/Prince Lewyn Martell has an older brother: Archmaester Marywn "The Mage". Marwyn is thus uncle to Oberyn and Doran and is, like Lewyn, the younger brother of the nameless former ruling Princess of Dorne, who was mother to Doran, Elia, and Oberyn.
  
• Obara Sand is almost certainly not Oberyn's daughter but Marwyn's.
  
• Oberyn's daughter Tyene Sand is already in King's Landing in the guise of the pock-marked, storky novice appearing in ADWD's Epilogue. Some of the textual reasons to believe this dovetail with the idea that Elder Brother is Lewyn. (See: the storks living around Quiet Isle.)
  

Here in Chapter 2, I will argue for the following propositions (which I acknowledge will at first blush strike many folks as just as outlandish, clearly absurd, totally batshit crazy, and/or surely impossible to support with any textual evidence as the first batch did):

• The nameless former ruling Princess of Dorne—mother of Doran, Oberyn and Elia Martell—is an incredibly important character. She was a classic Dornish libertine, and her children were sired by three different men.
  
• Her second child, Elia, was sired by Prince Jaehaerys Targaryen, a few years before Jaehaerys was crowned Jaehaerys II.
  
• Her third child, Oberyn, was sired by Jaehaerys's son, Prince Aerys, a few years before Aerys was crowned Aerys II.
  
• The nameless former ruling Princess of Dorne is still alive. She did not die, but—in keeping with the "rhyme" already established between history's King Charles I of Spain and the Martells—abdicated and retired to a holy sanctuary, in part due to what was at the time crippling gout (like the gout that prompted Charles's abdication and retirement to a monastery).
  
• She is living in King's Landing as Septa Scolera in the company of none other than Septa Mordane, known as Septa Moelle, and Maege Mormont, known as Septa Unella.
  
• Scolera's gout is well-managed by her consumption of sour milk products—the single best thing a person with gout can consume.
  
• Scolera's true name is likely Sarella; Oberyn's daughter Sarella is likely her namesake.
  

Oberyn and Elia: "Martells" Who Are Also Targaryen Bastards

I submit that in the mid-to-late 250s, Doran Martell's mother, the Princess of Dorne—possessed of freewheeling Dornish-Targaryen sexual mores—bedded her older cousin Prince Jaehaerys, the future-King Jaehaerys II. Their coupling resulted in the birth of Elia Martell. Mere months after Elia's birth, the Princess of Dorne then bedded Jaehaerys's son, Prince Aerys, the future Mad King Aerys II, who thus sired Oberyn Martell, the Red Viper.
Why do I think all this? It's complicated.

The Nine Year Gap

For the sake of brevity and simplicity, I'll call the nameless Martell Princess of Dorne who mothered Doran, Elia and Oberyn "Scolera", because I'll later argue that she's now called "Septa Scolera". (Her true name is likely Sarella, but "Scolera" avoids confusion with Oberyn's daughter, her namesake, Sarella.)
Given that Oberyn refers to Scolera's consort as "her consort", per se, rather than "my father" or "Elia's father"—

"It was when I visited Casterly Rock with my mother, her consort, and my sister Elia." (SOS Ty V)

—Oberyn clearly believes he and Elia were sired by someone else. Regardless of whether Oberyn knows the truth, his words (a) foreground the question of his and Elia's paternity, and (b) hint that Scolera kept things fresh in her bedroom.
While less definitive, Oberyn's words to Tyrion—

"Why, if the gods were cruel, they would have made me my mother's firstborn, and Doran her third." (SOS Ty V)

—are certainly consistent with he and Doran having different fathers, in that they only stipulate their common maternity.
Now, we know that after Scolera gave birth to Doran, she failed to have any children who lived past infancy until nine years later, when Elia and Oberyn were born in quick succession, defying Doran's expectations:

"I was the oldest," the prince [Doran] said, "and yet I am the last. After Mors and Olyvar died in their cradles, I gave up hope of brothers. I was nine when Elia came, a squire in service at Salt Shore. When the raven arrived with word that my mother had been brought to bed a month too soon, I was old enough to understand that meant the child would not live. Even when Lord Gargalen told me that I had a sister, I assured him that she must shortly die. Yet she lived, by the Mother's mercy. And a year later Oberyn arrived, squalling and kicking." (FFC CotG)

Two successful pregnancies after nine spotlighted years of infertility and crib deaths hints that Scolera found herself a fresh sperm donor—or two.

Timeline Issues

Let's take a quick look at the relevant timeline. Per Chapter 1's discussion of Obara's paternity, it's likely Doran was born in late 247 or early January 248, with Oberyn born close to 10 ½ years later, c. April-June 258. We know Doran "was nine when Elia came", and that "a year later Oberyn arrived". (FFC CotG) Since Oberyn was probably conceived c. July-August 257, this means Elia was likely born c. April-June 257 and conceived c. July-August 256 (although it's possible "a year later" rounded down the actual gap, meaning Elia was born/conceived 1-6 months earlier than that).
Aegon V/"Egg" was king until 259 AC. His second son Jaehaerys was almost certainly born in 225 AC—we're told his age during three different years, all of which yield "225" by simple subtraction—making him about 31 when Elia was conceived, which fits. (TWOIAF)
Jaehaerys's son Aerys was 18-years-old when he became king in 262, meaning he was born in either 243 or 244. Thus Aerys would have been at minimum an "old" 12 but more likely 13 if not 14 when Oberyn was conceived c. mid-to-late 257. If this seems "too young" to possibly bed the same woman his father bedded the year before, consider first that both parties were possessed of Targaryen blood, notorious for producing precocious sexuality. (Jaehaerys himself was only 14 or 15 when he eloped with his 13-14-year-old sister Shaera.) Moreover, and not, I think, coincidentally, we know that Oberyn himself was probably 11 or 12 when his supposed first bastard Obara Sand was conceived. If the world can believe Oberyn is her father, and if Aerys was almost certainly slightly older when Oberyn was conceived than Oberyn was when Obara was conceived, then obviously Aerys wasn't too young to sire Oberyn.
What about Scolera? Given (a) her own precocious Targaryen blood, (b) the cultural nature of Dornish sexuality (see below) and (c) the fact that she was still young enough to be a lady-in-waiting to Rhaella in 259 AC, when Joanna Lannister arrived—

"Lannisport was the end of our voyage," Prince Oberyn went on…. "Were you aware that our mothers knew each other of old?"
"They had been at court together as girls, I seem to recall. Companions to Princess Rhaella?" [said Tyrion] (SOS Ty X)
In 263 AC, after a year as the King's Hand, Ser Tywin married his beautiful young cousin Joanna Lannister, who had come to King's Landing in 259 AC for the coronation of King Jaehaerys II and remained thereafter as a lady-in-waiting to Princess (later Queen) Rhaella. (TWOIAF)

—I find it overwhelmingly likely that Scolera was very young when she gave birth to Doran back in 247-248: probably 12-15, making her only 20-25 when Elia and Oberyn were conceived. (A 12-year-old gives birth in Blood & Fire.)

The Point Of All That Targ & Dornish Smut

Let's assume Scolera was indeed 20-24 when Elia was conceived in 256. It's easy to imagine a 20-to-24-year-old culturally Dornish maternal Targaryen descendant of Daenerys Targaryen (and Mariah Martell) bedding a 30-year-old paternal Targaryen descendant of Daenerys's brother Daeron (and Mariah's brother Maron Martell) like Jaehaerys. But would the same woman then bed that man's son, a "man" roughly 9 years her junior, shortly after giving birth to said boy's half-sister? And would a 13 or 14-year-old Targaryen prince bed his older cousin mere months after she gave birth to the bastard daughter of his own father? Judging by everything we're told about Targaryen and Dornish sexual mores—seemingly gratuitous details that now smell like clever foreshadowing—hell yes.
Consider: The Targaryen drive to incest is drilled into us from the earliest moments of AGOT. Dany marries and begins enjoying sex at (supposedly) 13. Helaena Targaryen marries and conceives at 13. (tRP) Maegor the Cruel married and consummated at 13, Viserys II at 12 with a much-older bride of 19, who gave birth the following year! (F&B)
The Dornish, including Scolera's descendants, are similarly libidinal and precocious:

It was said that [Oberyn] bedded men and women both… (SOS Tyr V)
[Tyrion:] "Did you tire of your paramour on the road?"
"Never. We share too much." Prince Oberyn shrugged. "We have never shared a beautiful blonde woman, however, and Ellaria is curious. Do you know of such a creature?" (ibid)
[Oberyn:] "Her grace needs another husband, and who better than a prince of Dorne? Ellaria believes I should accept. Just the thought of Cersei in our bed makes her wet, the randy wench." (SOS Tyr I)
"I was abed with the Fowler twins when the word reached me," the captain heard [Nymeria Sand] say. (FFC CotG)
Dornish women were lewd… (DWD tW)
"Are you certain you are not off to some other bed, some other woman? Tell me who she is. I will fight her for you, bare-breasted, knife to knife." [Arianne] smiled. "Unless she is a Sand Snake. If so, we can share you. I love my cousins well." (FFC tSK)
"You need a woman, not a little girl, but I can play the innocent if that excites you."
"You should not say such things." Remember, she is Dornish. In the Reach men said it was the food that made Dornishmen so hot-tempered and their women so wild and wanton. (tSK)
[Arianne] and Tyene had learned to read together, learned to ride together, learned to dance together… They would have shared their first man as well, but Drey got too excited and spurted all over Tyene's fingers the moment she drew him from his breeches. Her hands are dangerous. The memory made her smile. (FFC PitT)
The Bastard of Godsgrace [Daemon Sand] was one of Dorne's finest swords as well, as might be expected from one who had been Prince Oberyn's squire and had received his knighthood from the Red Viper himself. Some said that he had been her uncle's lover too, though seldom to his face. Arianne did not know the truth of that. He had been her lover, though. At fourteen she had given him her maidenhead. Daemon had not been much older, so their couplings had been as clumsy as they were ardent. (WOW Arianne I)

I believe the drumbeat regarding Arianne's precocious sexuality—

"The Bastard of Godsgrace had my maidenhead when we were both fourteen." - Arianne (FFC tSK)

—is intentional, hinting that her grandmother Scolera was quite young when she gave birth to Doran, meaning Scolera was still only 21-25 when Oberyn was conceived (and thus potentially very attractive to the then-pubescent Aerys).
Meanwhile, the fact that Daemon Sand was also 14 at the time means he was about 18 years younger than his other erstwhile lover, Oberyn. That relationship presumably began when Daemon was a young squire, much as Aerys was a young squire at the time Oberyn was conceived. Significantly, the age gap between Daemon and Oberyn dwarfs the probable gap between Princess Scolera and Prince Aerys. Could Oberyn's proclivity to "bed with boys" (as against "men") be a wink to his mother doing the same vis-a-vis Aerys? (SOS Jai VII)
We also see Oberyn's 14-year-old daughter Elia Sand make out with Feathers, who is "twice [her] age". We know Elia Sand is 14, and thus that Feathers is around 28, because GRRM again reminds us of Arianne's sexual precocity:

It did not escape the princess that Elia was the same age she had been when she gave her maidenhead to Daemon Sand. (WOW Arianne II)

It's almost as if Martell women's interest in sex at an early age might somehow be relevant to our story, which it is if I'm right and Scolera was very young when she became pregnant with Doran and thus was still young enough to be of interest to Aerys when Oberyn was sired. Meanwhile, the age gap between Feathers and Elia is much larger than the age gap between Scolera and either of her putative princely paramours (including the other Elia's father).
Speaking of age gaps, when Oberyn recounts Scolera and Joanna Lannister's supposed plot to marry their children to one another, Oberyn conspicuously implies that Scolera had no problems with the age differences—

"Elia and I were older, to be sure. Your brother and sister could not have been more than eight or nine. Still, a difference of five or six years is little enough." (SOS Ty X)

—even as he drastically understates the age gaps, thus staying readers' alarm bells. In truth, Cersei and Jaime were born in 266. Thus Elia, who was likely born in late 256/early 257, was actually about nine years older than her would-be husband Jaime, which just so happens to be the age gap between Aerys and Scolera, assuming Scolera was 13 when she had Doran c. very late 247.
Fire & Blood contains several fresh instances of older women bedding much younger men. Especially relevant to our hypotheses, 19-year-old Larra Rogare was impregnated by a 12-year-old Targaryen prince who later became king, and 19-year-old Prince Aemond Targaryen was seduced by and impregnated Alys Rivers, who was…

twice his age (thrice, if we put our trust in Mushroom). (F&B 460)

Two more details from F&B are just as pertinent to our hypotheses. First, we learn of a young lord who took his own father's widow (who was older than him and with whom he had long been infatuated) as his paramour, fathering children on her and eventually marrying her. (FB 581-582) In comparison, the idea that Aerys merely bedded his father's paramour seems tame.
Second, we read about a ruling Princess of Dorne who took one look at the Valyrian-blooded "dragonseed" Alyn Velaryon and decided she must have him, despite his famous marriage to a Targaryen princess:

Lord Alyn required fresh water and provisions for his ships, whilst Princess Aliandra required services of a more intimate nature. … the attentions the flirtatious Dornish princess lavished upon him much displeased her own lords, and angered her younger siblings…(F&B 652)

I suspect Aliandra's descendant Princess Scolera had similar "requirements" of Jaehaerys and/or Aerys, and given everything we've said about Dornish and Targaryen sexuality, it's unlikely a Targaryen-blooded Dornishwoman like Scolera would have had misgivings about bedding and having the children of first a married Targaryen father and later his betrothed son. After all…

"Even death is not sacred to a Dornishmen." (DWD tW)

In sum, Targaryens and Martells (with their Targ blood) fuck young, and they fuck much oldeyounger people, often and with relish. (Regarding the allusions to the Martells having same-sex sex partners, this suggests there may have been a sexual aspect to Scolera and Joanna's friendship, to be discussed later.)

Aerys: A Charming, Handsome Youth

Even if Aerys's age was no issue, why would Scolera want to sleep with him, specifically? A look at the young Aerys answers that question and shows that much of what we're told about him comports perfectly with him siring Oberyn.
First, Aerys is Targaryen; Scolera's Targ blood would find that inherently attractive. Blood aside, TWOIAF makes it clear that the young Aerys was a tasty dish, nothing like the unkempt man he became. At the time of his ascension to the throne in 262, Aerys was "a handsome youth". Selmy calls him "charming and generous." (SOS Dae VI) TWOAIF agrees:

[Aerys] had an undeniable charm that won him many friends.

A few years after Oberyn was conceived, Aerys "fought gallantly in the Stepstones during the War of the Ninepenny Kings" and "won his spurs" at 16. (TWOIAF) Surely something of his physical quality was manifest a few years earlier. Who wouldn't like this guy?

The young king was lively and active in the early years of his reign. He loved music, dancing, and masked balls… (TWOIAF)

Notice that Aerys's love of music and dance is mirrored by Oberyn, who Ellaria Sand says wrote her songs—

"Will [vengeance] make me laugh, write me songs, care for me when I am old and sick?" (DWD tW)

—and who is noted as dancing at Harrenhal. (He's Meera's "red snake"). (SOS B II) (I cannot confirm whether Oberyn enjoyed masked balls.)
Aerys's plethora of mistresses—

Some say he had as many mistresses as his ancestor Aegon the Unworthy…. Unlike Aegon IV, however, Aerys II always seemed to lose interest in his lovers quickly. Many lasted no longer than a fortnight and few as long as half a year. (TWOIAF)

—doesn't hurt the idea that he was attractive. It's also remarkably reminiscent of Oberyn, who has a large brood of bastards by different women (including a few we haven't been told about whom I will discuss in future Chapters.)
Scolera was likely Aerys's first lover, and I believe he maintained an abiding interest in her (as he did in Scolera's friend Joanna Lannister), belying his fickle tendencies. Thus Aerys's trip to Dorne in 270 makes perfect sense as a visit to his erstwhile lover and their son, Oberyn. Reunited (and perhaps quietly proud of the fierce young man Oberyn was becoming), Aerys promised Scolera the moon, as men will do:

His Grace was full of grand schemes… [Four such "schemes" are described, then…] In 270 AC, during a visit to Sunspear, he told the Princess of Dorne that he would "make the Dornish deserts bloom" by digging a great underground canal beneath the mountains to bring water down from the rainwood.
None of these grandiose plans ever came to fruition; most, indeed, were forgotten within a moon's turn, for Aerys II seemed to grow bored with his royal enthusiasms as quickly as he did his royal paramours. (TWOIAF)

Two things to notice (for the present purpose, anyway): First, the project of making a desert bloom is a blatant metaphor for getting someone pregnant who previously had difficultly conceiving, as was the case with Scolera prior to Elia's conception. That talk of digging a canal doesn't hurt. ("Laying pipe", anyone?) Nor does the remark about plans failing to come to "fruition", often "within a moon's turn". (Conception and menstrual cycles, anyone?)
Second, GRRM chooses to casually mention Aerys's many paramours immediately after bringing up his trip to Dorne and his promise to the Princess of Dorne, who I believe was one such paramour.
While Aerys's grandiose, quickly abandoned plans may evidence his "vain, proud, and changeable" nature, "these flaws were not immediately apparent to most at the time of his ascension," and were surely even less apparent (to Scolera) a few years earlier, when Oberyn was conceived. (TWOIAF)
Eventually, of course, Scolera came to realize what Aerys became. Thus her knowing comments to Doran about "madmen":

"My mother taught me long ago that only madmen fight wars they cannot win." - Doran Martell (FFC tSK)

Like Father, Like Son?

Compare the foregoing portrait of the young Aerys with our introduction to Oberyn Martell, who is a renaissance man, or, uncharitably, a dilettante:

[Oberyn] had traveled in the Free Cities, learning the poisoner's trade and perhaps arts darker still, if rumors could be believed. He had studied at the Citadel, going so far as to forge six links of a maester's chain before he grew bored. He had soldiered in the Disputed Lands across the narrow sea, riding with the Second Sons for a time before forming his own company. His tourneys, his battles, his duels, his horses, his carnality… it was said that he bedded men and women both, and had begotten bastard girls all over Dorne. (SOS Tyr V)

Oberyn's dilettantish tendencies—he dabbles at being a maester, soldier, tourney knight, lover, songwriter—and his "unpredictable" nature are strikingly reminiscent of Aerys II's "changeable" nature, "endless caprices" and "grand schemes". (DWD tW) We're told verbatim that Oberyn "grew bored" of his studies, just as Aerys "seemed to grow bored" after initial enthusiasm for new endeavors. Like father, like son.
Oberyn's success as a soldier mirrors Aerys's, who as mentioned "fought gallantly" during the War of the Ninepenny Kings.
Both men guzzle wine. Aerys "drank too much wine" at Tywin's wedding and was "very much in his cups" at the Anniversary Tourney of 272. (DWD Dae VII; TWOIAF) Oberyn complains that Tyrion's wine isn't strong enough (Tyrion IX) and even drinks before dueling The Mountain, saying:

"I always drink before battle." (SOS Tyr X)

While Oberyn's wine-swilling jibes with Doran's and Quentyn's wine-savoring, Elder Brother Lewyn's (former) alcoholism and red, veiny nose, and Marwyn's sourleaf habit, what about the capacity for moderation evinced by Doran, Quentyn and Lewyn? Marwyn might chew sourleaf, but at least he's dry. Oberyn's immoderation thus makes even more sense if he's Aerys's son.
Both Oberyn and Aerys are laughers and japers. Oberyn laughs every time we see him, including in Arianne's memory, and has been a japer since he dubbed Baelor Hightower "Breakwind". (SOS Ty V, IX, X; FFC tCoG) Ellaria even references Oberyn making her laugh. (DWD tW) Notwithstanding the bias of our sources, we're repeatedly told of Aerys japing and laughing:

Lord Rykker said, "If we need gold, His Grace should sit Lord Tywin on his chamber pot." Aerys and his lickspittles laughed loudly, whilst Father stared at Rykker over his wine cup. (FFC C II)
The king replaced him as Hand with Lord Owen Merryweather, an aged and amiable lickspittle famed for laughing loudest at every jape and witticism uttered by the king, no matter how feeble. (TWOIAF)

Aerys's tendency toward levity is again implied in a passage which contrasts Aerys with Tywin:

[T]he King's Hand was all that the king himself was not—diligent, decisive, tireless, fiercely intelligent, just, and stern. (TWOIAF)

Tywin actually draws a curiously similar (if implicit) contrast between (Aerys's son) Oberyn and Doran, just before his words (probably unwittingly) betray the truth of Oberyn's paternity:

"Prince Oberyn's presence here is unfortunate. His brother is a cautious man, a reasoned man, subtle, deliberate, even indolent to a degree. He is a man who weighs the consequences of every word and every action. But Oberyn has always been half-mad." (SOS Ty VI)

Doesn't it make perfect literary sense that the bastard son of the "Mad King" would be casually referred to as "half-mad"?
Notice that Doran's caution and deliberation don't just set him apart from Oberyn, as Tywin implies. Deliberate, reasoned Doran is equally the opposite of the changeable, capricious Aerys, which makes sense if Aerys is Doran's opposite number Oberyn's father. Of particular note: Doran is oddly called "indolent"—meaning lazy or "inactive"—in contrast to (his opposite number Oberyn's father) Aerys being called "lively and active".

Oberyn and Aerys's Other Son, Rhaegar

Oberyn's aptitude for scholarship may at first seem to belie his paternity: Aerys was "not… the most intelligent" prince. (TWOIAF) But remember, Aerys's son Rhaegar was clearly intelligent:

"As a young boy, the Prince of Dragonstone was bookish to a fault." (SOS Dae I)

What we know of Rhaegar's looks suggests a close relationship between him (and thus his father Aerys) and Oberyn that's not shared by the other Martells.
Dany sees Rhaegar as distinctly "taller" than Viserys. (COK Daen IV) She calls Rhaegar "a fierce warrior". (GOT D V) Rhaegar thus being a tall, "fierce warrior" sounds much like Oberyn, who is "fierce", "tall, slim and graceful," "slender" and "fit". (SOS Tyr V, IX) Equally important: Oberyn's physique has almost nothing in common with Quentyn's, Marwyn's, Morgarth/Elder Brother Lewyn's or, implicitly, Doran's.
In Dany's House of the Undying vision, Elia is holding baby Aegon and asks Rhaegar,

"Will you make a song for him?

…which echoes Ellaria's lament that Oberyn can no longer "write me songs".
Rhaegar's music-making fingers—

Many a night [Cersei] had watched Prince Rhaegar in the hall, playing his silver-stringed harp with those long, elegant fingers of his.…

—sound like Oberyn's notably "slender hand[s]", which are nothing like Doran's, Lewyn's, or Marwyn's giant, gnarled, knuckly ham hands. (SOS Tyr V) Oberyn's "slender hands" have only one verbatim match in the canon: Melisandre—

She clasped the bars of his cell with her slender white hands. (SOS Dav III)

—who many believe is (also) a Targaryen bastard, Shiera Seastar, or Shiera's daughter. And if you believe Cersei is (also) Aerys's child, it must be said that hers are the only "slender" fingers in ASOIAF:

…Cersei Lannister did not cry out. Her slender fingers brushed her cheek, where the pale smooth skin was already reddening. (GOT E X)

Saturnine

Tyrion calls Oberyn's face "saturnine":

The princeling removed his helm. Beneath, his face was lined and saturnine, with thin arched brows above large eyes as black and shiny as pools of coal oil. (SOS Ty V)

Saturnine means having qualities which were attributed in the middle ages to the planet Saturn: gloomy, cold, brooding, morose and remote. This is fascinating for two reasons. First, Saturn was thought to have these qualities in part because it was believed to be the furthest planet from the sun, which is the Martells' sigil. Is it thus hinted that Oberyn isn't just a Martell?
Second, who does "gloomy, cold, brooding, morose and remote" sound like to you? How about this guy:

"But I am not certain it was in Rhaegar to be happy."
"You make him sound so sour," Dany protested.
"Not sour, no, but . . . there was a melancholy to Prince Rhaegar, a sense . . ." The old man hesitated again.
"Say it," she urged. "A sense . . . ?"
". . . of doom. He was born in grief, my queen, and that shadow hung over him all his days." (SOS Dae IV)

Selmy all but calls Aerys's (other) son Rhaegar "saturnine".

Oberyn's Targaryen Eyes

Cersei remembers Rhaegar's eyes in liquid terms:

Cersei had almost drowned in the depths of his sad purple eyes. (FFC C V)

Oberyn's eyes—

large eyes as black and shiny as pools of coal oil. (SOS Tyr V)

—are clearly liquid as well. Lest we doubt, the only other reference in the canon to "coal oil" spells this out:

The bird's black plumage shone like coal oil in the torchlight. Wet, Theon realized. (DWD Th I)

One could drown in "pools of coal oil", right? "Coal oil" is a notably flammable liquid, and Dany envisions Rhaegar's eyes aflame:

And saw her brother Rhaegar, mounted on a stallion as black as his armor. Fire glimmered red through the narrow eye slit of his helm. (GOT Dae IX)

Oberyn's liquid eyes are not found among the Martells that aren't his daughters. We're indirectly told as much when we meet his daughter Tyene:

Her hair was gold as well, and her eyes were deep blue pools . . . and yet somehow they reminded the captain of her father's eyes, though Oberyn's had been as black as night. All of Prince Oberyn's daughters have his viper eyes, Hotah realized suddenly. The color does not matter. (FFC CotG)

Notice that it's only the color that "does not matter" to the viper-quality. Tyene's "viper" eyes are thus logically characterized precisely by their Rhaegar-like depth ("deep") and liquidity ("pools")—qualities also present in dragons' eyes. For example:

[Viserion's] eyes were lakes of molten gold… (DWD tDT)

It also matters that Oberyn has "large eyes". While Tyrion calls him "a salty Dornishmen for certain", Oberyn's large eyes fly in the face of (a) stereotypes—

She had always heard that Dornishmen were small and swarthy, with black hair and small black eyes… (SOS Ty V, A VIII)

—(b) Uthor-the-Martell-signpost's small black eyes and (c) Arys Oakheart's impressions after hanging around Doran's court:

[Arys] could feel eyes upon him everywhere he went, small black Dornish eyes regarding him with thinly veiled hostility. (FFC tSK)

Large eyes are, however, typical of recent Targaryens. Aerys and Rhaegar share a gene pool with Egg's son Jaehaerys (given two generations of sibling incest), and Jaehaerys's eyes are "very large". (SSM Targaryen Kings) Jaime says Aerys's eyes were "huge" when he killed him:

Those purple eyes grew huge then… (SOS Jai II)

Oberyn's "large" eyes are also tagged as "dark"—

The prince's eyes were dark with amusement. (SOS Ty IX)

—thus textually matching Egg's "eyes large and dark" as seen in The Sworn Sword. Elsewhere, Egg's eyes are called "deep"—like Tyene's—and "dark", like Oberyn's:

In the dimness of the lamplit cellar they looked black, but in better light their true color could be seen: deep and dark and purple. Valyrian eyes, thought Dunk. (tSS)

Rhaegar's eyes are "dark indigo" and Aerys has "dark eyes" like Oberyn, too—

Upon a towering barbed throne sat an old man in rich robes, an old man with dark eyes and long silver-grey hair. (COK Dae IV)

—while Aerys's "silver-grey" hair matches the "streaks of silver" in Oberyn's hair:

Only a few streaks of silver marred the lustrous black hair that receded from [Oberyn's] brow in a widow's peak… (SOS Ty V)

Note that the black color of Oberyn's eyes and (the rest of his) hair doesn't mean Aerys didn't sire him. Baelor Breakspear, who was the son of a purple-eyed, silver-gold-haired Targaryen king and Mariah Martell, had neither purple eyes nor metallic hair, but rather the "dark hair and eyes" of his Martell mother. (SSM Targaryen Kings; tHK; TWOIAF) Bittersteel was likewise the black-haired son of a silver-gold-haired Targaryen king. (SSM The Great Bastards, Targaryen Kings)

Sexy Rhaegar

Rhaegar's overwhelming sex appeal, especially to young Cersei—

Had any man ever been so beautiful? He was more than a man, though. His blood was the blood of old Valyria, the blood of dragons and gods…
When she had been presented to him, Cersei had almost drowned in the depths of his sad purple eyes. He has been wounded, she recalled thinking, but I will mend his hurt when we are wed. Next to Rhaegar, even her beautiful Jaime had seemed no more than a callow boy. (FFC C V)

—matches Oberyn's, who not only scatters bastards about the world but was analogously extremely attractive to Arianne when she was yet a girl:

"And what did you do, princess?" asked Spotted Sylva.
I sat beside the well and pretended that some robber knight had brought me here to have his way with me, [Arianne] thought, a tall hard man with black eyes and a widow's peak. The memory made her uneasy. "I dreamed," she said, "and when the sun went down I sat cross-legged at my uncle's feet and begged him for a story."
"Prince Oberyn was full of stories." (FFC tQM)

If Aerys had a whit of Oberyn and Rhaegar's sex appeal, why wouldn't Scolera have wanted him, especially given the Targaryen incest drive—exemplified by Arianne's fantasy here (and for those so inclined, by Cersei's attraction to Rhaegar)?

Stallions Black As…

One further link between Rhaegar and Oberyn: Oberyn's horse is notably Targ-colored—

The Dornish leader forked a stallion black as sin with a mane and tail the color of fire. (SOS Ty V)

—and it's even described in a way reminiscent of Rhaegar's horse (and what follows):

And saw her brother Rhaegar, mounted on a stallion as black as his armor. Fire glimmered red through the narrow eye slit of his helm. (GOT D IX)

Oberyn, Viserys, Bloodraven

Oberyn is coded as a Targaryen king's bastard in a few other ways.
Oberyn is a "hard man"

a tall hard man… (FFC tQM)

—whose "lined face"—

His face was lined… (SOS Ty V)

—matches Viserys's—

It was a severe look that emphasized the hard, gaunt lines of his face. (GOT D I)

—and Bloodraven's:

He was older than Dunk remembered him, with a lined hard face… (tMK)

Like Oberyn, Bloodraven is a Targaryen king's bastard, and for what it's worth I believe Viserys may be a Targ bastard, too. (He's called "less than shadow of a snake", which I suspect hints that he was sired not by Aerys but by a figurative snake. Whether this "snake" was Lucerys Velaryon, Aerys's master of ships and a descendant of "the Sea Snake", Oberyn himself [the Red Viper, "that snake of a Dornishman", "that smiling Dornish snake", "that red snake"], or another is another discussion.)
Speaking of Viserys, Oberyn being sired by Aerys is consonant with Oberyn's actions after Robert's Rebellion, which so happen to be mentioned immediately after he's portentously referred to as "half-mad"

"…Oberyn has always been half-mad."
"Is it true he tried to raise Dorne for Viserys?"
"No one speaks of it, but yes. Ravens flew and riders rode, with what secret messages I never knew. Jon Arryn sailed to Sunspear to return Prince Lewyn's bones, sat down with Prince Doran, and ended all the talk of war. But Robert never went to Dorne thereafter, and Prince Oberyn seldom left it." (SOS Ty VI)

Oberyn Had Wings

Is there a neat little wink at Oberyn's paternity when he duels Gregor?

The crack of the ashwood shaft snapping was almost as sweet a sound as Cersei's wail of fury, and for an instant Prince Oberyn had wings. The snake has vaulted over the Mountain. (SOS Ty X)

Snakes don't have wings, but dragons do.

Oberyn's Apple

It's my belief that ASOIAF uses apples to represent people with Targaryen blood. GRRM almost says as much in the extended Westerlands essay—

There was a worm inside the apple, though, for the growing madness of King Aerys II Targaryen would soon imperil all that Tywin Lannister sought to build.

—and I've written about how Oberyn's daughter Sarella ("Alleras") shooting apples in AFFC's Prologue represents the deaths of the Baratheon brothers (whose grandmother was Rhaelle Targaryen).
I think Oberyn's own death is prefigured by an apple as well: a rotten apple, which makes more sense if he's Aerys-the-wormy-apple's son than if he's merely the great or great-great-grandson of the first Daenerys. Jon is walking among rotten apples after refusing to kill an old man who has eyes described in a way—

The man kept staring at him, with eyes as big and black as wells. I will fall into those eyes and drown. (SOS J V)

—blatantly redolent of how Rhaegar's eyes—

Cersei had almost drowned in the depths of his sad purple eyes.

—and especially Oberyn's eyes—

large eyes as black and shiny as pools of coal oil

—are described, both structurally and substantively, inasmuch as they are "big and black as wells" and "wells" connotes oil, as in Oberyn's "pools of coal oil".
What does Jon do?

Jon walked away. A rotten apple squished beneath his heel.

And how does Oberyn die? His head is crushed, like the apple beneath Jon's heel. (Is it an accident that Tyrion's puke contains apples and "fiery [like a Targ] Dornish peppers"?)

Clegane slammed his fist into the Dornishman's mouth, making splinters of his teeth. "Then I smashed her fucking head in. Like this." As he drew back his huge fist, the blood on his gauntlet seemed to smoke in the cold dawn air. There was a sickening crunch. Ellaria Sand wailed in terror, and Tyrion's breakfast came boiling back up. He found himself on his knees retching bacon and sausage and applecakes, and that double helping of fried eggs cooked up with onions and fiery Dornish peppers. (SOS Ty X)

Thin Eyebrows and a Sharply Pointed Nose

Oberyn has "thin arched eyebrows". Oberyn raises or lifts a "thin black eyebrow" twice more. (SOS Tyr V, IX) As discussed in Chapter 1, this firmly links Oberyn to Uthor Underleaf, thus underscoring Uthor's symbolic role, which helps astute readers realize that Elder Brother is Prince Lewyn. But his brows are not, I think, typically Martell. Thus Marwyn's "brow beetled", which could imply he has thick, shaggy eyebrows. Oberyn's brows seem elegant and hence, perhaps, Valyrian.
Similarly, Oberyn's "sharply pointed" nose is nothing like Quentyn's "too broad" nose, nor Lewyn's "bulbous" red honker. (DWD tMM, FFC Ala II) (Curiously, Lewyn's companion Ser Shadrich has a "pointed nose", and Marwyn's associate Leo Tyrell's nose is "long and thin and pointed". [FFC Ala II, Pro]) I suspect Oberyn's nose is, at least in part, a dissembling way of referring to his Targaryen paternity, inasmuch as Valyrians have "aquiline" noses—

Ser Laenor had the aquiline nose… that bespoke his Valyrian blood. (tRP)

—a term which derives from the Latin word for "eagle-like" and which refers to an eagle's beak, which is nothing if not sharp.

Angry Targaryen Bastards

Doran says something about the Dornish that hardly seems true of himself:

"We Dornish are a hot-blooded people, quick to anger and slow to forgive. It would gladden my heart if I could assure you that the Sand Snakes were alone in wanting war, but I will not tell you lies, ser. " (FFC tSK)

He then implicitly posits Oberyn's bastard daughters as exemplifying these qualities. And remember, the Sand Snakes' and Arianne's vengeance-fueled push for war is in fact an echo of Oberyn's plan to crown Myrcella and thus provoke "the Lannisters and the Tyrells [to] come down on us". (FFC CotG)
Now, guess who is described using the exact same language Doran uses to talk about those who think like the Sand Snakes (who took their lead from Oberyn)? A Targaryen king:

Aegon II was two-and-twenty, quick to anger and slow to forgive. (P&Q)

We read something similar about another Targaryen which explicitly ties this quality to "the blood of the dragon", coincidentally vis-a-vis a row concerning none other than a Princess of Dorne:

It is said that he and his wife quarreled before the voyage, for Lady Baela [Targaryen] was of the blood of the dragon and quick to anger, and had heard too much talk from her husband about Princess Aliandra of Dorne. (F&B 702)

CONTINUED IN OLDEST COMMENT, BELOW